Broken Arrow
by ZVArmy
Summary: When WWE end the PG era, they re-sign Ronda to play a part in forming the new era. Will she and Seth Rollins be able to rekindle their relationship after two years apart? Will Ronda's second run with WWE be as controversial as the first, or will she reach her full potential and become one of the most dominant female wrestlers ever? *Seth/Ronda story 7 of 11*
1. Chapter 1 - Prologue

_Author's note:_

 _There are original characters in this series which were created by my readers. I offered the chance to have a character feature in the story and selected the ones I liked the most from the submissions I received. I'll list the characters and their creators below so that everyone has the credit they deserve for creating them._

 _May Devany - created by Willow Edmond_

 _Anna Hollenbeck - created by Debwood-1999_

 _Alexis Styles - created by Shiki94_

 _Sarita Lopez - created by Chaka1967_

 _I thank all of the people named above for the use of their characters and the time they put into creating them._

* * *

 _ **PROLOGUE**_

Roman Reigns and Dean Ambrose halted their conversation immediately when their locker room door opened. They both turned to face the third man who shared the locker room, Seth Rollins, as he walked in and tossed his bag into the corner of the room with a sigh. "Where the fuck have you been all day?" Dean demanded, not bothering with any kind of greeting. There was no hostility to the question, it was just the way Dean usually spoke to his two closest friends.

"Somewhere quiet, needed to be by myself," Seth mumbled. "I had thinking to do." The expression on his face revealed that the thinking time had not entirely helped him resolve whatever the problem had been. Seth looked miserable, which was why Dean resisted making any kind of joke about him attempting to think, as he usually would have.

"Sit down and tell us what's happened," Roman said pleasantly as he sat down himself, gesturing to a chair opposite his own. Roman was almost certain that he already knew what the problem was, and so was Dean. It certainly wasn't going to be anything to do with having to work a house show in the ass end of nowhere on a Wednesday night. That was just part of the job, even if it did suck at times.

"I think you can probably guess," Seth said, running a hand through his hair as he sat down. "I broke it off with May last night."

"Sorry, man," Dean grimaced.

"Are you going to be okay?" Roman asked. He knew from past experiences of his own that it was one thing to see that a relationship was heading towards an inevitable end, but it was another to actually end it. The failure of any relationship brought sadness, at least at first.

"Yeah. Yeah I'll be alright," Seth began quietly. "It needed to be done, for both our sakes. Hell, we'd pretty much stopped spending any time with each other anyway, these past few weeks. As you know, she suggested that we went to stay at her folk's place last weekend to try and get some time together and work it out, but of course she ended up spending most of the time with her three million brothers and sisters. I guess it's something to do with her being the eldest. They flock around her like you wouldn't believe. I don't know how her parents could raise so many kids. Their house is so frantic and noisy, I was ready to murder someone by Monday morning. Anyway, we didn't really work anything out. If anything, it told me I was right to be thinking about ending it. I mean, May's great with kids. You guys have seen her with the Make-A-Wish kids around this place. The thing is, it's all the time with her. There never seemed to be any time for us."

Roman knew that Seth could at times be self-centred to say the least when it came to his relationships with women, which was the major reason that he had a history of cheating. But this wasn't the time to bring up something like that. He was about to ask how May had taken the news, but Dean got in first, taking both Roman and Seth by surprise.

"Bullshit. Well, not bullshit, but tell it like it is. Things haven't been going well for you and May for weeks, a couple of months at least. You've just stayed together because neither of you could quite bring yourselves to pull the trigger. You've done it now because Ronda's coming back Monday. Do you actually even realise how often you've been talking about her since you saw her the other week? If you want to sell me a pen, tell me it's a pen, not a pencil."

Seth narrowed his eyes slightly at Dean's weird final sentence. "Huh?"

"I'm saying just be honest," Dean said. "You fucked up with Ronda. Both of you fucked up, and you both regret it. We know that from what she said to Rome. You think Ronda might feel the same way you do, which is that you really want to make another go of it. _That's_ why you've broken it off with May, not because she's got a bunch of brothers and sisters who get on your fucking nerves."

Although Dean had a reputation for not being the sharpest knife in the drawer, it was largely because of his on-screen character. Seth had to admit that sometimes Dean could read him like a book. This was one of those occasions. He closed his eyes for a couple of seconds before conceding the point. "Fine. You're right, it wasn't working for May and I, and yeah, I want Ronda back. That girl still drives me wild."

Dean looked at Roman and held out his right hand. "Twenty bucks."

"You bet on me leaving May?" Seth asked irritably.

"No we didn't. We bet on you and Ronda getting back together, which hasn't happened yet, so this tool can stick twenty bucks up his ass," Roman said. He wished Dean would have kept the bet private, but at least he could try to make a joke out of it.

"Come on," Dean whined, even though he was grinning. "Just pay up. I told you this would happen that night we all went and watched Ronda's first movie. Fuck, that thing sucked." Dean pointed at Seth. "But he sat there practically drooling for two hours. You might as well just give me the money now."

Seth laughed. "I did not." Even though he denied it, he knew he was full of shit, and he knew he was fooling no one with his denial.

"Is May okay?" Roman asked Seth, bringing a more serious tone back to the conversation.

"Yeah, she is," Seth said, now sounding a lot happier than when he had walked in. "I think she knew that the end was coming. I think part of her might have actually been relieved that she didn't have to think or worry about it anymore. Let's be honest, May's a nice girl, she's popular, and she's great looking. She'll only stay single for long if she chooses to."

Dean grinned, knowing what his friend was thinking. "She just ain't Ronda, as far as you're concerned."

"She just ain't Ronda," Seth repeated with a hint of a grin of his own. "We're going to have some talking to do," he added, meaning himself and Ronda.

"So what?" Roman said. "You managed to man up and talk to May. Man up and talk to Ronda. The girl's still lost on you anyway. I saw it. Hell, she may as well have said it to me. That would have been the only way she could have made it more obvious."

Dean stood and headed for the door. "I gotta go take a piss."

"That dude pisses like a racehorse," Roman laughed after the door closed behind Dean.

Seth laughed too, but then his face grew serious again. "I really hope we can work it out when I talk to her."

Roman considered this for a second. "I don't doubt that you _can,_ but I can't say if you _will_ ," he said thoughtfully. "I'll tell you the same thing I told her the other week, although I told her it for a different reason. If you do get back together and then start getting at each other's throats again, I'll bang your heads together. Understood?"

"Yes, big brother," Seth smiled, even though he knew Roman was only half joking. He then stood up, walked over to his bag and began to unpack it. The first two items he removed were bottles of water and he tossed one to Roman, who caught it one handed.

"Thanks. You know, part of me had started to think that this was going to turn into a real miss with you sleeping with Ronda behind May's back. I know what you're like."

Seth let out something between a grunt and a humourless laugh as he removed his shirt. After setting it aside, he looked Roman in the eye. "Me too," he admitted frankly. "And I didn't want it to come to that. I've been there a couple of times before and I don't want to go back again."

Roman nodded in acknowledgement as he opened his bottle of water, then downed half of it in one hit. He let a companionable silence descend on the locker room for a few moments while Seth returned to unpacking his bag. As Roman watched his brother, he smiled to himself as he decided that now would be the ideal time to slip in a piece of news of his own. "Ronda and I were texting the other night, actually," he revealed. "She told me what they've got planned for her at 'Mania and afterwards."

"Really?" Seth asked, still unpacking his bag, not really paying full attention to the conversation. It took him a couple of seconds to catch on, and when he did so his head whipped around to face Roman. "What do mean, 'afterwards?' It's only supposed to be one match they brought her in for."

"That was the original deal. But I know that Monday night, she's going to sign with WWE," Roman announced. "Three years."

"Oh shit," Seth breathed in surprise as his eyes widened a little.

"I thought you might say that," Roman laughed.


	2. Chapter 2

Backstage before Raw, Hunter Helmsley walked into his office with a satisfied smile on his face. "Everything set, Nick?" he asked his most senior cameraman.

"Yeah. Good to go."

"Perfect," Hunter said, clapping his hands together as he surveyed the office. It had been meticulously prepared for the filming of Ronda Rousey's contract signing. He had to admit to himself that signing Ronda for three years represented something of a gamble, given how her first run with the company had gone, but he backed himself to be able to manage her. For one thing, the circumstances were a lot different this time. There was no reason for her to cause disruption over creative anymore as she didn't have everything riding on her career as a wrestler as she had in the past. At this point, win or lose, Ronda's popularity and star power would take care of itself, and that had always been her biggest concern.

Having his wife taking on Ronda in a street fight was hardly Hunter's ideal scenario, but Stephanie had wanted to do it, and there was no doubt that the fans were looking forward to it. When the street fight stipulation had been added to the match a week before, the crowd had broken out into a chant of 'Ronda's gonna kill you' at Stephanie, clearly showing how well the hype for the match was building. Stephanie trusted Ronda to ensure that she came out of the match without any injuries more severe than bumps and bruises, and so did Hunter. Ronda worked stiff in the ring, there was no doubt about that, but she knew what she was doing.

Hunter took a moment to take in the scene that would soon be presented to the audience. Two expensive leather chairs had been placed behind his desk. The contract was sitting there on the desktop, waiting to be signed with the gold fountain pen he had brought especially for the purpose.

"I know what you're thinking," Stephanie said. He looked over at her, sitting on the black leather couch which was pushed up against the wall at the end of the office.

"What am I thinking?" Hunter asked, still smiling.

"You're thinking about whether you want to pull out of having Ronda sign that thing at the last minute."

Technically, Stephanie was wrong, that wasn't what he was thinking at that moment, but he had thought it a few minutes earlier. Ronda had proved that she could be very difficult if the mood took her, and that kind of thing could be bad for the locker room as a whole. Ultimately though, Hunter knew that if he didn't sign her, UFC almost certainly would. It was common knowledge that they had recently tried to do exactly that at least once.

Hunter reasoned that sometimes in business, it was necessary to look at things cynically. Ronda Rousey, with her stupid wristbands, had an incredibly large following of people who bought into that kind of blatant PR nonsense. If Ronda knew how to do anything aside from fight, then it was how to generate good PR for herself. He had no intention of letting UFC reap the benefits of the Rousey bandwagon when he could have his own company do so instead. The possible extra effort that might be required from him to manage her would definitely be nothing compared to the amount of money that she could bring into WWE, and money was the most important thing to consider in his position as Chairman of WWE.

"Actually, I was thinking about those 'Ronda's gonna kill you' chants," Hunter clarified for his wife with a little smirk. "We still need to work out the finish to your match. I've got a couple of ideas floating around. We can go over them when we've got this finished up," he said, gesturing to the contract. "Ronda's going to be here soon."

* * *

Five minutes later, Ronda and her agent, Willow, were walking along a nondescript hallway much like thousands of others in arenas around the world as they headed for Paul's office. Ronda wore a relaxed expression, but the reality was that she was anything but relaxed. Tonight was the night that she had been waiting weeks for. Firstly, there was the contract signing to deal with. In itself it was merely a formality, simply signing a sheet of paper, but it meant a lot more than that to her. As she walked beside her agent in silence, she could not stop her mind focusing on everything that signing this contract stood for.

 _It means vindication. I'll show you Vince, you old bastard. You were wrong to release me the way you did. You threw me out like a piece of garbage, and where are you now? Sitting at home, that's where you are. Probably wearing diapers now, too. You think I don't remember sitting in my car that day, crying after our meeting? Well, I hope you shit yourself when you see that I'm back, Vince._

 _It means opportunity. You want to call me a waste of talent, Ric Flair? You think all I've got is my popularity with the fans? You're wrong. I respect you, but you're wrong. I'll prove it to you, and then you'll admit it to me. You'll tell me that I am what I am: The best female wrestler in history._

 _Most importantly, it means the chance of revenge. May Devany, you four foot tall piece of shit, once I sign this contract, you're on borrowed time. I'm smarter than you think, May. You think I'm stupid enough to come at you and beat the shit out of you in the locker room? No. I punched Seth, and that was a mistake. A mistake that was your fault, May. There won't be any mistake this time. There's no recourse if you get hurt in the ring, in a match. Even if you try, you can't sue me. You can only sue WWE, and then all I have to do is say that it was an accident. No one can possibly prove otherwise. You might get something from WWE, you might not. I don't care. One chance in the ring with you, that's all I need. I bet it's going to surprise Hunter when I ask him what I'm going to ask him, but it's probably the only way I'll get my hands on you, May. I will make you hurt. I will make you see my eyes every time you close yours._

"Here it is, Ronda," Willow said pleasantly, stopping outside of an office door with Hunter's name on it.

Saying nothing, Ronda knocked on the door and walked in, with Willow following behind. Introductions and greetings were exchanged all round. When this was complete, Hunter spoke to Ronda. "We're going to film the signing, Ronda, so we can put it on the website. We'll also have a picture taken to put on Twitter and everything. Check over the contract and we'll get this done."

"Check it," Ronda ordered Willow. She spoke pleasantly enough, but didn't bother to use any manners, a fact which didn't escape Stephanie as she looked on.

The red haired woman walked over to the table, picked up the contract and began to read over it. Ronda turned and looked at Stephanie, unable not to admire the older woman's appearance and physique. "Looking good, Steph. It's going to be some match at 'Mania."

"Definitely," Stephanie smiled, studying Ronda in turn, who also looked to be in the shape of her life. She was wearing a T-shirt which revealed her huge arms. Stephanie couldn't help herself imagining what it might be like for someone to try to fight Ronda for real, in UFC for example. Ronda had recently been uploading videos to Instagram from her training sessions and some of the sparring that she had been doing bordered on the ridiculous. She had been taking on both men and women, and they had stood no chance when trying to defend themselves against her judo. Those videos alone were adding so much hype to the upcoming match. Stephanie continued, "The crowds have been lapping it up, this thing with Shane and I, and then whenever you get mentioned they go crazy. Just like old times really," she finished, instinctively wondering if that was such a good thing after all.

To Stephanie's surprise, Ronda seemed to consider this for a moment before responding. The actual response was even more of a surprise to her. "You know, the most fun I ever had in this place was when I was a referee, playing a heel. You remember that storyline you put me in, Hunter? Getting heat was really cool."

"What's that?" Hunter asked. His attention had been focused on Willow and the contract rather than listening to the quiet conversation between Ronda and his wife.

"I was just saying that playing a heel was a lot more fun than playing a face. Being a face is boring. Come out, wrestle, play up the crowd, leave. Been there, done that. Being a heel would be great."

Hunter and Stephanie glanced at each other, then looked back at Ronda. "I have to admit, I didn't know I don't remember starting to do drugs," Hunter joked. "This is Ronda Rousey telling me that she _doesn't_ want to be out there playing up to the fans? If anyone ever mastered that art, Ronda, it's you."

"That doesn't mean I want to keep doing it," she shrugged. "I've done it before. I got popular. I am popular. I can play a heel here now and it's not going to change that fact. I'm popular outside of this place. I get TV appearances, I get movie offers, I get commercial offers, I get anything you care to think of. Playing a heel for WWE isn't going to change that at this point. The only question is, can you write something good enough to get people to boo me?"

Absently scratching at the back of his head, Hunter thought for a moment. "You're serious about this?"

Ronda made a dismissive hand gesture as she played a calculated gamble. "I just said I'd enjoy it. It's your creative, not mine. I might have kicked up a shit storm in the past, but those days are gone. You guys write the script, I act it out. If you want me as a face, more power to you."

 _Bite, Hunter,_ Ronda pleaded silently.

"This is all as we agreed," Willow announced from the desk as she set the contract back down. She had cut back in at the worst time for Ronda. "You can go ahead and sign it, Ronda."

 _Fuck! Fuck you, Willow! Now how am I going to know what he was about to say?_

Hunter walked around the desk and sat down, leaving Ronda no choice but to do the same. They went through the process of having pictures taken as Hunter signed the contract first on behalf of WWE, then Ronda signed it herself. The deal was done. They posed for a final picture, both smiling as they shook hands.

"Why don't you let me put that picture up first?" Ronda said a moment later. "I've got more followers than WWE anyway. Might as well make a big impact with it."

"Oh my lord," Stephanie whispered to herself, amazed by the extent of Ronda's ego. Even though she had grown up around wrestlers her whole life, Stephanie still heard things from time to time that took her by surprise. This was one of those things. She shared a quick glance with Willow, who raised one eyebrow slightly and gave an almost imperceptible shake of her head. _You're used to this, huh?_ Stephanie thought.

A couple of minutes later, Ronda uploaded the picture of herself and Hunter posing to her Twitter and Instagram with the caption: Three years!

With that, the meeting was concluded. Willow politely said her goodbyes, then followed Ronda out of the office. It escaped no one that Ronda hadn't actually thanked either Hunter or Stephanie as she said goodbye herself. If anything, she seemed to believe that she was the one doing them some kind of favour by signing for WWE again.

"Wow," Stephanie sighed when the door closed behind Willow. "She's something else, huh?"

Hunter shrugged. "We knew that coming in. Don't let it get to you. You know what's messed up? She does have more followers than us. More than twice as many actually, which is insane. The news will be on our website by now anyway. Let her have her little satisfaction and her snide little comments. We'll make a lot more money out of this than she will."

Stephanie ran a hand over her face in frustration. "It's actually ridiculous how much that irritated me. I don't think I can take three years of Ronda Rousey hype to be honest."

After holding the door open for the camera crew to leave the office, Hunter walked over to the couch and loudly blew out a deep breath as he sat down next to his wife, who had also just taken a seat on the couch again. "What if we do away with it?" he said a moment later. "Do away with it around here at least."

"How do you mean?" Stephanie asked, unable to stop a little grin from appearing on her face. She could tell when her husband had what he considered to be a good idea coming together in his head.

Hunter looked Stephanie in the eye and smiled. "The walking ego wants a heel turn. I'll give her one."

The glint that had appeared in his eyes was unmissable to Stephanie, and unmistakable in it's meaning. "Tell me more," she urged.

* * *

While the meeting and contract signing had been taking place in Hunter's office, Renee Young had found her her fiancee, Dean Ambrose, speaking with a small group of fans who were on a backstage tour. She waited patiently for him to finish up and hand the group over to Cesaro, who was one of the most popular guys on the current roster, unlike Dean, who was currently on a heel run.

"Hey," Dean greeted Renee as he walked over to her.

"Hey yourself," Renee smiled before kissing him lightly on the cheek. Dean wasn't one for public displays of affection, so that was as far as it went. "Want to grab a coffee?" she asked hopefully as they began to walk side by side along the hallway.

"Yeah, why not?" Dean agreed. "You can never have too much coffee." Relationships within WWE were always difficult, and time to spend together was seriously limited for Renee and Dean at the best of times, so at Raw and Smackdown events they would spend as much of it together as they could.

"I saw the Queen arriving," Renee announced sarcastically.

Dean looked at her with a puzzled look on his face. "Steph? What's your problem with her? You didn't mention..."

"Not Stephanie," Renee laughed. "Ronda 'I'm better than God' Rousey is here. I saw her walking in with some red headed woman. Probably her agent, I guess."

Chuckling at the new nickname, Dean asked, "What's your beef with Ronda?"

They walked into catering and over to the coffee pots. Renee began to pour two cups. "You know what my 'beef' is. The way Seth treated May. Two years she gave that guy. Two damn _years_ , Dean, and what does she get? The minute Queen Ronda decides to grace us with her presence, Seth can't get rid of her fast enough so he can try to get back with Ronda. He might as well have actually just told May he was just using her the whole time. At least that would have been honest."

"You're ranting, girl," Dean pointed out as he picked up his cup of coffee. "Thanks," he added.

"Sure. Let's go sit down?" They walked over to a nearby empty table and sat down opposite each other. Renee picked up her train of thought. "I know I'm ranting, but it pisses me off big time. May's a great girl, twice the woman that Ronda is, and Seth's an asshole for doing what he's done. Hell, they deserve each other." Renee knew that she wouldn't get an angry reaction from Dean, even though she had just insulted one of his closest friends. They were used to speaking their minds with each other and were totally comfortable in doing so.

"Could have been worse," Dean said, sipping from his coffee. "He could have cheated again. Part of me was expecting that to happen, honestly."

Renee's response was to simply grunt derisively. "Well, I don't want to spend any time with that woman. If you do, it's up to you. I know you guys get along, but keep me out of it. I don't like her. I don't like her personality, I don't like her attitude and I don't like how certain people fawn over her."

"Roman, you mean?" Dean asked although he already knew the answer. "They're close, alright?"

Renee shifted in her chair. Even though she was firm in the opinions that she was voicing, it was still a little awkward to talk about her fiancee's friends like this. "I know, but he goes too far with it. He's been a prick to May more than once, you know he has. Look, all I'm saying is this: Ronda Rousey coming back here is bad news for everyone apart from Ronda Rousey and Seth Rollins. She's bad news, and I don't want anything to do with her."

Dean could see that Renee was completely serious about every word. "Okay," he shrugged. "If that's how you feel, I'll make sure not to invite her out anywhere with us. Can we talk about something else now? Tonight maybe? Dinner? Going up to the hotel room? Trashing the hotel room?"

A mischievous grin appeared on Renee's face. "Only you could make trashing a hotel room sound like a romantic proposition."

"I'm a romantic guy," Dean grinned back, before having to stifle an ill-timed belch which forced it's way out.

"Hmmm," Renee said, before giving up on holding her laughter back.


	3. Chapter 3

Roman could tell by the ringtone that it was Seth's phone that he could hear ringing, but he couldn't see where it was. The sound had a muffled quality to it and was coming from the corner of the locker room, near to where Seth's open bag sat on the end of a bench. Roman picked up the bag and sure enough the phone was underneath it. Seth had gone to the men's room a few minutes earlier. A single word was flashing on the phone's screen: Mom. When he picked up the phone and saw who was calling, Roman made up his mind to answer on his brother's behalf, knowing that he would not mind.

"Hey, it's Roman. Seth's in, uh, the men's room."

The response surprised him. Seth's mom had always been pleasant whenever he had spoken to her in the past, but now she was abrupt and sounded annoyed. "Is that what he told you to say?"

"Huh?" Roman asked, surprised. "No, he's really in the men's room. He left his phone in the locker room. I'll tell him to..." At that moment Seth walked back into the room and closed the door. "Never mind, he's just walked back in."

Roman covered the phone with his hand as he held it out to Seth. "It's your mom," he whispered. "Sounds pissed off."

"Why did you fucking answer it?" Seth mouthed, barely audible even to Roman. As he took his phone, Seth knew exactly what this was going to be about. It was going to be a lecture about finishing with May. Avoiding this lecture was why Seth had been ignoring calls and texts from his mom for the past several days. She had probably given up and called May instead, and then May would have provided all the details. _Perfect,_ he thought, groaning inwardly. "Give me a minute?" he asked Roman.

"Sure," Roman said, trying not to laugh out loud at Seth's obvious discomfort as he headed for the door. The look on Roman's face caused Seth to grin too, despite himself, but he also raised his middle finger to his friend as he opened the door.

"Hey mom," Seth said into the phone when the door closed behind Roman. He thought he had done a relatively good job of hiding his reluctance.

His mom started right into him, however. "I suppose you would've ignored this call too, huh? Well there's no need. I've been texting with May, so I know what's happened. What the hell is wrong with you?"

Seth rolled his eyes and sat down on the bench. "It wasn't working out, mom. Neither of us had our hearts in it anymore. I did the right thing by ending it."

He heard a derisory snort. "You did the right thing for yourself, you mean. At least you think you did. I know you're not going to stand there and say that this has nothing to do with Ronda being back working with you."

For a moment Seth considered being sarcastic and saying that he was sitting down not standing, but that wouldn't help the situation any. Instead, he decided to be totally honest and see how she liked that. "Yeah, Ronda's back. She's in the arena somewhere right now, actually. If all goes well, when I leave tonight I'll be taking her with me."

"Oh, for God's sake," his mom groaned in something close to disgust. "You ended it with May for Ronda, didn't you? Sometimes I wonder where you got your brains from, because it sure wasn't from me or your dad."

Seth bristled. "Yeah, you don't like Ronda. I know, alright? You've made it perfectly clear in the past."

He heard a humourless laugh. "No one who actually knows her likes her, from what I hear, apart from you and Roman obviously, maybe Dean too. She's one of the most recognisable women in the world, that's what I keep hearing. She's got millions of fans, and yet she has virtually no friends. What does that tell you?"

"It tells me I'm done with this conversation," Seth replied, anger beginning to creep into his voice.

There was a brief silence on the line. When she spoke next, Seth's mom's voice had softened a little. Bad cop had been replaced by good cop. "Look, I worry about you, okay? It doesn't matter how old you get, you're still my son. That woman is bad news. She trashed your life the first time she was in it, in the space of just a few months."

Rubbing his eyes with his free hand, Seth sighed in frustration. "She didn't ruin my life, mom. Now you're just being ridiculous."

The reply contained more than a hint of sarcasm. "Next you're going to tell me she didn't punch you in the face, I suppose?"

That was the final straw for Seth. He felt his grasp on his temper slipping away. "Yeah, she punched me. She gave me a left hook that I didn't even see coming and it floored my ass as well as splitting my lip, but you know what? It was my fault. I cheated on her and then broke up with her like a coward on the phone. I'm not surprised that she punched me. I did the opposite with May. I broke up with her in the best way I could. It's not a nice thing to do, however you do it. The bottom line is that whether you like it or not, whether _anyone_ likes it or not, I still love Ronda. I miss her like crazy and I want to be with her. I know pretty much for certain that she feels the same way, so I'm going to talk to her and we'll see what happens. If we do get back together, you can either be happy that I'm happy, or you can keep your nose out. You got that?"

Without waiting for a reply he ended the call and was only just able to stop himself from hurling the phone at the wall opposite him in anger. He didn't care if other people wanted to judge him, but they were not going to tell him how to live his life. _Ronda drives me crazy,_ he thought. _What's the point in trying to deny it? I've spent two years doing that already._

* * *

Being close friends with Nikki Bella meant there wasn't much that went on backstage in WWE that Ronda didn't find out about in short order. The fact that Seth had broken off his relationship with May Devany certainly hadn't taken long to filter through. For that reason, signing a new contract with WWE was only the first of Ronda's goals for that Monday night. Making her feelings known to Seth was the second, and that was only because she had been required to report to the contract signing as soon as she arrived at the arena. With the signing dealt with, and with Willow on her way to the airport, Ronda had headed for the locker room that she was sharing with Nikki.

As Ronda had asked, Nikki had given her Seth's current cell phone number and then made herself scarce, leaving Ronda alone in their locker room. She had sent a text to Seth to say that she was in Nikki's locker room and that she was alone if he wanted to talk. She considered the possibility that Seth might have his phone off, but she would cross that bridge if a few minutes went by without any kind of reply from him.

A reply to the text message never did arrive, but after a few tense and nervous minutes had dragged by for Ronda, there was a quiet knock on the locker room door. She felt herself burning up as she stood and made for the door, which opened as she approached it. She had to fight herself so as not to throw herself at Seth as he slipped through the door and closed it quietly.

"You came back," was all he managed to say, looking at her with lust in his eyes.

"You finished with May." Ronda said, backing Seth into the door as he put his arms around her. She had missed that feeling so much over the past two years that it was almost a physical relief to back in his arms again. There had been sex with other men of course, but nothing approaching the sex with Seth, and certainly nothing approaching love.

"You punched me in the face," Seth said, voice barely above a whisper.

"You cheated."

Seth took in a breath and his nostrils filled with Ronda's perfume. She still wore the same one. "You're a Gattina," he grinned.

Ronda remembered what her nickname for Seth had been. "You're an asshole," she breathed. With that, they began to kiss passionately, almost frantically. Two years of separation only added to the fire that had always burned between them.

Feeling Ronda moving her hand down the front of his pants, Seth gasped between kisses. "We've never had sex in a locker room before."

"There's a first time for everything."

* * *

"What does this mean?" Ronda asked quietly. She was lying in Seth's arms on the bed in his hotel room. What she had just referred to as 'this' was the three times they'd had sex in the hotel room over the course of Monday night. Right now the covers were almost entirely on Seth's side of the bed, but neither of them had tried to rectify that.

Seth liked the view that it afforded him. Ronda was wearing nothing but the familiar black wristband which she never took off and a very expensive and attractive looking silver ring in her navel piercing, however he let his eyes wander around the hotel room for a second. The morning light which managed to filter itself through the curtains revealed that the place had certainly come out of the night a lot worse than it had gone in. Any damages that the hotel might charge to him would be a price that he considered more than worth paying. Sex in the locker room at the arena, added to three more times back at the hotel was a performance that he had to feel pleased with. It would certainly be worthy of mention to Roman and Dean at some point in the near future. Ronda's appetite had seemed insatiable, which he knew from their first time together wasn't out of the ordinary for her at all. She liked it rough and she liked it often, both of which were just fine with him.

"I hope it means we're back together," he replied. "Is that what it means?"

"I want it to mean that," Ronda said earnestly. "I want it to _work_ this time. I know I fucked up last time. I blamed it all on you at the time, but that wasn't fair. I was ruining our relationship a long time before you were. I was acting kind of out of control and, yeah, I'm sorry."

Absently twirling a few strands of Ronda's hair around one of his fingers, Seth considered that for a moment. Her admission that she had been in the wrong was definitely something that he was glad to hear. There had been no doubt in his mind that he wanted to try again, but it would not have been natural for him not to have had concerns that the second time around could end the same as the first, potentially even worse. "We'll both need to try much harder this time," he replied eventually. "It's one thing to say we want it, it's another thing to put the effort in when it's needed. We won't get to see each other as often as the first time, that's one thing for sure."

Ronda twisted herself around slightly and lifted her head so that she could look Seth in the eye. "I want to make it work and I want to put the effort in. I _will_ put the effort in, I promise you that. I missed you for two fucking years, Seth. I missed you almost every day. I love you."

Seth raised an eyebrow. " _Almost_ every day?"

"Asshole," Ronda giggled before settling back into her previous position with her head resting on his chest.

"I love you too," Seth said, smiling like the Cheshire Cat.

An hour later they were showered and almost ready to leave the room to go have breakfast when Ronda's phone rang. Her first instinct was to complain about someone calling so early, but then she remembered that she was actually up a lot later than usual. There would certainly be no chance of catching Roman, Dean or Renee still eating breakfast this late.

"Who's that?" Seth asked as he put on a T-shirt.

Ronda looked at her phone and paused for a second. "Hunter," she announced with mild surprise. She then answered the call in much the same way.

Hunter had made a decision on Ronda's combination of hint and request as far as a heel turn was concerned. In his opinion it would be better for all concerned if there was less hype surrounding Ronda on her second run with the company. It might help to keep her in check. With that in mind, he had come up with an idea for the Rousey - McMahon match at Wrestlemania as well as a storyline to follow it. He knew that it wasn't necessary to pitch his idea to Ronda, but he wanted to keep her happy and on-board. "Hello, Ronda," he greeted her pleasantly. "I just wanted to let you know that we've got something for your match with Steph. I thought about what you said yesterday and I like it. The heel turn, I mean. Now, I remember you saying that you wanted to make this the most memorable women's match ever. I'll be honest, this idea doesn't fit that bill in the way you intended it, but I have a feeling you might like it."

Ronda knew that Hunter didn't have to try to sell the idea, whatever it was, to her like this, but she appreciated the fact that he was making the effort to do so. "Go on," she urged.

It took a couple of minutes, but when Ronda had heard the full pitch she had to admit, "I really do like that. Okay, let's do it. But, where does that leave me? After 'Mania I mean."

She heard a laugh on the other end of the call. "You're going to like that even more."

Ronda's eyes widened as she listened to his next idea. He was right. She did like it. She liked it a lot. Wrestlemania couldn't come soon enough now. She ended the call after saying as much, and turned to Seth. "Well, I'm getting a heel turn."

" _You_ are getting a heel turn?" Seth asked, raising his eyebrows in surprise. "Are you ready to go?" he added, gesturing to the door with his head and picking the room key up from the floor where it had apparently fallen.

"Yeah, I'm ready." They headed out of the room and towards the elevators as Ronda repeated Hunter's pitch of the upcoming storyline almost word for word.

While they waited for an elevator to arrive on their floor, Seth digested the idea. "Hunter thinks they're going to boo that?" he asked eventually, his tone indicating that he suspected the opposite might well be the case.

"It's up to us to make them," Ronda grinned. There was a loud ping and one of the four sets of doors slid open. "I'm used to people not liking me, Seth," she said as they walked into the elevator. "Until I got the jump off at WWE, I went through my whole life with pretty much everyone hating on me. I'm comfortable with it. I'm not afraid to be disliked by people. In fact, I enjoy it in a way. Think about it, aside from Nikki and Brie, no one in the locker room ever liked me, and did you catch me giving a fuck? Going out there and pandering to crowds isn't the real Ronda Rousey. The real Ronda is the kind of girl who will tell people what she thinks, whether they like it or not, and then kick their faces in if they want to make something of it."

Seth smiled. He couldn't help himself. It was something he knew a lot of people would fail to understand, but that attitude and aggression was something he had always found so attractive about Ronda. It was only when she had started to develop a huge ego to go along with it that they had started to have problems. "Go into it with that kind of attitude and I think you can really make it work. Actually, I know you can."

"Thank you." Ronda reached up for a kiss, but it ended up being brief as the elevator reached the ground floor and the doors opened.

They walked into the hotel's restaurant and saw that the place was packed. Another disadvantage of starting the day later than usual. There was a sign near to the restaurant's entrance asking people to wait to be seated, but there was no staff member there to greet people, so they were simply ignoring it and walking in. Seth and Ronda followed suit and when they walked in they looked around for an empty table. Seth could only see two, and one of them was covered in used plates and cups from a group who must have left only moments before. "Over there," he pointed at the one table which was actually empty. "Go get that table for us and I'll get our food and coffee."

"How do you know what I want?"

"Trust me," Seth grinned.

With a contended smile on her face, Ronda headed over to the table and sat down. For the first time in a very long time, she actually felt happy. She imagined breaking the news to Maggie. Ronda had first met her friend and housemate on a dinner date with Seth. Ironically, it was Seth that Maggie had wanted to meet, but as Seth and Ronda had been together at the time, they had both gotten to know her. Ronda had always stayed in regular contact with Maggie, and when the younger woman had mentioned that she was looking to move out of her father's house at the same time that Ronda was looking to buy herself a new house, the answer had seemed obvious. Maggie needed somewhere to live and Ronda needed a friend for company. _I should invite Maggie to come backstage at Wrestlemania,_ Ronda thought. _That would be awesome for all three of us._

Ronda looked over at Seth, who was in the process of fixing two cups of coffee. The contented smile returned to her face once more. Glancing around the room, her eyes settled on someone else. May Devany was sitting a few tables away, sharing breakfast with Dolph Ziggler. She was laughing heartily at something that Dolph had just said. May either hadn't seen Ronda enter the room side by side with Seth, or she simply didn't care. The smile slowly faded from Ronda's face as she stared, and transformed into a scowl. She felt her hands clenching tightly into fists. _Don't think I've forgotten about you. This changes nothing. You owe me, bitch. Two years._


	4. Chapter 4

_**Wrestlemania 34**_

A faint scratching sound was all that could be heard in Ronda Rousey's locker room, despite the fact that three people were in there. WWE had made the offer of a private locker room to Ronda for every appearance she had made since returning to the company, but this was the first time that she had accepted. There was a set routine that she would go through before a big match, and wrestling Stephanie McMahon in front of eighty five thousand people at Wrestlemania was certainly a big match. In fact it was the biggest of either woman's career, as well as being Stephanie's last ever match.

Part of Ronda's routine was to sit in complete silence for the final half hour before going to the ring. She used the silence to focus on exactly what she needed to achieve in the ring. For her, everything had to be done just right and executed perfectly. There could be no mistakes. Mistakes were not acceptable. She had often wondered if it was some kind of actual mental condition she had, similar to OCD in some ways. Whatever the reason, for her to be happy with the match, it had to look perfect and the finish had to happen just right in order for it to have the desired effect on the audience.

The scratching sound was coming from a black Sharpie which Maggie was using to draw on the white tape that was wrapped around Ronda's right hand and wrist. The work on the left hand had already been finished. On that hand Maggie had elaborately drawn a three digit number which represented the number of days that it had been since Ronda had wrestled a match, and now on the right hand she was drawing the elaborate RR logo that she herself had designed for use on Ronda's merchandise. It was the very final stage of the preparations.

Ronda was already wearing the ring attire that WWE had provided for her. Rather than her usual black sports bra and shorts, for this match she wore the same items but with an army camouflage design, which was to tie in with her movie Wasteland, in which she played a staff sergeant in the US Army. The one off ring attire wasn't the only thing that WWE had organised for the occasion, either. Ronda knew that her entrance had to be timed perfectly, which was why the third person, a tall man with graying hair, was in the room with them, standing near to the door. He was runner for WWE. Soon he would get the signal in his earpiece, and it would be time to go.

When Maggie finished her work a couple of minutes later, she didn't say anything, simply placing the cap back on the Sharpie and setting it aside. She had only just done so when the signal came.

"It's time, Ronda," the runner announced as he opened the door. "Are you ready?"

Ronda didn't reply, but she got up and marched quickly out of the locker room. Maggie had already wished her luck earlier, before the silence had been imposed on the locker room, as had Seth before he had headed off to prepare for his own match later in the show. The runner marched side by side with Ronda, but he could tell that she was barely aware of him being there. She was too focused on other much more important things.

They reached the Gorilla Position just as the video promo for the match ended, which was earlier than Ronda had wanted. She didn't like to have to stand around waiting when she was fully prepared to enter the stadium, but it was too late now. Stephanie McMahon was already there, ready to enter the first. She was exchanging a hug and a kiss with her husband as Ronda approached them. Stephanie was dressed in a one piece leather outfit which had been custom designed and made for her especially for the upcoming match.

Out in the arena, Lillian Garcia began to unnecessarily announce what the next contest was going to be, as if the promo package had left anyone in any doubt.

"Good luck, Ronda," Hunter said with a smile as he walked past, knowing that she would not want or accept anything more than that. He had seen her with her game face on before.

Ronda nodded slightly to acknowledge him, then offered her left fist for Stephanie to bump, which was as close as she was going to get to a wish of good luck or anything similar. Stephanie returned the gesture a little awkwardly and her entrance music started to play, drawing thunderous boos from the crowd. She took a deep breath and walked through the curtain.

* * *

Lillian Garcia stood in the middle of the ring with a dazzling smile on her face. "The next contest is a street fight, set for one fall. If Stephanie McMahon wins without outside interference, she gains full control of WWE. If Ronda Rousey wins or should there be any outside interference on behalf of Stephanie McMahon, full control of WWE will go to Shane McMahon."

The crowd erupted into thunderous boos as Stephanie's music hit, and they continued unabated as she walked down the incredibly long entrance ramp and walkway with a smug, confident smile on her face. If she had any fear about the fact that she was about wrestle Ronda Rousey one on one, she certainly wasn't showing it.

"Here we go, JBL," Saxton said excitedly. "Stephanie McMahon and Ronda Rousey in a street fight. I've been looking forward to this for two months."

"Look at Mrs McMahon," JBL said, obviously sucking up. "She looks incredible. She looks ready. She looks prepared. She looks confident. I think she can beat Ronda Rousey."

Saxton countered, "Rousey has never lost a one on one match without there being outside interference. Stephanie has a task in front of her that has never been accomplished by anyone before, and she's not even a wrestler. You might want to keep those facts in mind, John."

Stephanie climbed up the ring steps and through the ropes and then walked into the middle of the ring. Lillian announced, "Introducing first, one of the principal owners of WWE, Stephanie McMahon!" Stephanie raised both of her arms in the air triumphantly and her smile grew even wider. The booing from the crowd increased in intensity once more, but then faded out along with Stephanie's music.

Almost everyone in the crowd seemed to rise to their feet as one as a very familiar chant broke out. In just a few seconds, Ronda's name was thundering throughout the stadium. "I think it's a good job this place doesn't have a roof," Saxton quipped. "We'd be about to lose it. You can physically feel the anticipation here at ringside."

The seconds dragged by. JBL said, "Ronda's making Stephanie wait, making her think about what she's about to go through. I've got to admit that's smart." He had only just finished the sentence when the theme music to Wasteland hit. Inevitably, the crowd exploded.

"Wow!" Saxton exclaimed. "Listen to this ovation for the star of Wasteland! Ronda Rousey is back in WWE!"

Fans were shown literally jumping up and down and screaming as Ronda marched out onto the stage and started to make her way down the ramp. This was the part of the entrance that had needed to be timed to perfection for the last part of the Wasteland tie in. As Ronda walked down the ramp, three F/A-18 Hornet fighter jets screamed over the top of the stadium with their afterburners lit. The outside two banked away over the sides of the stadium and middle one shot almost vertically upwards. The roar from the engines drowned out the crowd and the music for a few moments. Whoever had planned this piece of over the top pageantry clearly hadn't considered the fact that the US Army and Air Force were two completely different branches of the armed forces.

"Incredible," was all JBL could say as Ronda approached the ring.

Lillian announced, "And her opponent, the star of Wasteland, the most dangerous woman on the planet, Ronda Rousey!" Ronda climbed through the ropes and stood there glaring at Stephanie with an apparent intent to kill as the crowd roared at the announcement of her name.

As she looked across the ring at her opponent, Stephanie's arrogance seemed to have faded away quickly, but she didn't look intimidated. She had a game face of her own. There was now no specific chanting from the crowd, but the noise level in the stadium was remarkable in anticipation of what was about to transpire.

"It's time to go to war," Saxton announced. "This is what you call the big fight feel, John. I have goose bumps."

Referee Mike Chioda made a very deliberate show of saying a few words to Ronda and then walking over to Stephanie and doing the same. The two competitors walked closer to the middle of the ring. "Let's go!" JBL urged.

Chioda signaled for the bell. Neither woman rushed in to attack. Instead, they paced around the ring, staring into each other's eyes the whole time. Somehow the noise of the crowd seemed to get even louder. After a few moments of this, Stephanie made the first move, trying to rush Ronda and take her by surprise. Ronda reacted and got Stephanie in a headlock, but the taller woman was able to push Ronda away, sending her into the ropes, but when Ronda came back off the ropes she ran shoulder first into Stephanie and knocked her on her ass, drawing a huge roar from the crowd.

"First blow to Rousey," Saxton called out. "Stephanie bounced off her like a rubber ball."

"Back her off," Stephanie barked at the referee from her sitting position on the canvas, who complied and backed Ronda off a little.

Stephanie got back to her feet and the two women went to lock up once more, but this time Ronda flipped Stephanie over and slammed her to the mat hard on her back with a judo throw. This set the tone for the opening five minutes of the match. Ronda didn't seek to mount any offence of her own, but countered every attack that Stephanie tried to make with a judo throw, completely outclassing and outmatching her opponent. After this had happened twelve times, Stephanie rolled out of the ring to the floor, clearly hoping to at least get a moment to regroup.

"This isn't even a contest," JBL mumbled. "Ronda's just beating the hell out of her."

Saxton laughed. "What did you honestly think was going to happen?"

"Rousey's not even attempted to pin her," JBL groused. "Chioda hasn't even had to make a count yet."

Ronda saw that Stephanie was stalling for recovery time and jumped out of the ring to go after her. Unseen by anyone, Stephanie had pulled a chair out from under the ring. As Ronda walked around the corner of the ring, Stephanie had just got back to her feet. She turned, and in the same motion swung the chair as hard as she could, catching Ronda flush on the forehead. The sickeningly loud crack of metal on skull drew a groan from the crowd and then seemed to silence them as Ronda slumped to the floor, sitting with her back against the side of the ring.

"Jesus Christ!" Saxton exclaimed at the moment of impact.

Knowing that Ronda was likely in trouble after failing to block the chair shot with her hands, Stephanie fell to the floor also, making out that she was still suffering from her previous beating. Why Ronda had not put her hands up to defend herself as she should have done was a mystery.

The camera shot panned from Stephanie back to Ronda and the crowd groaned once more, this time in horror. Blood was pouring from a three inch long cut on the top left of her forehead, just below the hairline, and it was already dripping down onto her chest and stomach. Chioda bent over Ronda to check on her. From her position on floor, Stephanie watched and saw the tiny signal from the referee that Ronda had said that she was okay to continue. Luckily, the end of the match was near anyway.

"Ronda Rousey is in trouble here," JBL said. "Come on Stephanie, get on her. This is your chance."

Stephanie was already up. She grabbed Ronda's hand and used it to haul her to her feet. With that task accomplished, Stephanie rolled her into the ring and then rolled in after her. With blood still flowing down her face, Ronda used the ropes on the opposite side of the ring to help her get to her feet. She turned around and stumbled groggily towards Stephanie who was now standing in the middle of ring, ready and waiting.

"Ronda's completely out of it after that chair shot," Saxton said. "She doesn't know where she is."

Stephanie attempted to get a DDT on Ronda, but as before Ronda countered the attempted offence with a judo throw. This time the throw looked very clumsy and lacked impact. Most of the crowd didn't even count along this time, therefore Ronda could clearly be heard as she said, "Give me a Pedigree." The throw didn't hurt Stephanie at all and she got right back up, faster than Ronda could.

Once again, Stephanie waited for Ronda to get to her feet. When she did so, Stephanie kicked her in the stomach and got her in the setup position for the Pedigree. "Stephanie's going for it early," Saxton called out as Ronda's arms were being hooked behind her back.

"Pedigree!" JBL called out as Stephanie hit the move, to almost no reaction from the crowd. Ronda rolled onto her back and Stephanie covered her. "Stephanie into the cover."

One.

Two.

Three.

The crowd howled in shock and jumped to their feet. No one had seriously entertained the possibility that the first cover of the match would end it, not even Saxton. "What the... What happened?" he exclaimed. That would be the final piece of commentary of the segment, and the camera shot would remain fixed on the main shot of the ring, both of which would seem out of the ordinary to audience watching at home.

Stephanie quickly rolled out of the ring and backed away from it, keeping her celebration noticeably muted.

It took almost a full minute for the crowd to begin to recover from the shock and start to chant, "Bullshit!"

Ronda was now back to a sitting position in the middle of the ring. For a few moments she just sat there breathing heavily and dripping blood onto herself and the canvas before unceremoniously rolling under the bottom rope and heading for the entrance ramp, looking a little unsteady on her feet.

One of the biggest Wrestlemania upsets had just taken place, and around the world millions of people were keen to make their opinions known. They were already dividing themselves into groups with different theories as to what had just happened.

* * *

When Ronda walked back through the curtain, there was quite a crowd waiting for her, but Stephanie was the first to go to her. "Damn it, Ronda. Are you okay? Why didn't you block that chair shot?"

"It looked better this way," Ronda mumbled.

Seth had also approached and he now tried to put an arm around her. "Jesus, babe. Come on, we need to get you to the doctor's office. You're still pouring blood."

Ronda fended him off. "Don't touch me," she repeated several times, mumbling and holding her hands up defensively to keep everyone back, as if she wasn't really focused on where she was or what was happening. She walked out of Gorilla and slumped down to sit with her back against a wall.

"Ronda, honey, you need to get checked out," Seth urged gently, crouching down beside her. Stephanie, Hunter, Maggie and some other backstage employees all crowded around.

"Don't touch me," Ronda breathed again. "Just leave me. Back off. All of you."

"We need some help over here," Hunter shouted.

Maggie crouched down on the other side of Ronda. She had never seen her friend hurt, and she had never seen her act like this either. It was a big shock to her and panic crept into her voice. "Ronda, I don't like the look of your head. It looks bad. You need to get it looked at. Come with us, okay?" She looked at Seth. "Do something. Pick her up or something."

One of WWE's doctors arrived and Maggie moved out of the way to let him get next to Ronda. He began to ask her a question, but she seemed to not notice that he was there. "Hunter!" she called out, managing to raise her voice. "Hunter!"

Hunter crouched down in front of her. "I'm here. Let us get you up, huh?"

"How did it go down? Like we planned?" she asked, sounding dazed.

Hunter guessed that she might have sustained a concussion. "Like a fucking dream," he assured her, unable not to smile. "Twitter's on fire already. People saying we screwed you over, other people saying you were out cold and couldn't kick out, others saying you misheard the count. Some people are saying they heard you call for the Pedigree and that you might have known you couldn't continue. Others are calling all of the other opinions stupid. Just how we hoped, really. Now, can you get up for me? We need to get you checked out."

Another voice spoke next, causing Hunter to back off a little to give the new arrival some room. A hand was held out towards Ronda. "Yeah, she can get up. Come on. You pulled it off like I said you would, now get up and get to the doctor. Now."

Ronda stared up at the new arrival for a second and then accepted the offered hand. It belonged to Ric Flair. Ric assisted Ronda to her feet and got underneath her left arm to support her as she walked. Seth quickly moved in under her right arm. The doctor walked beside them, trying again with his questions to Ronda. Maggie trailed after them as they headed for the doctor's office.

Watching the group walk away, Stephanie shook her head and turned to her husband. "Why did she do that, Hunter? I specifically said to her that I wouldn't swing the chair at her head if she didn't agree to block it. God damn it. Look what I did to her. She's a mess."

Hunter put an arm around his wife and they headed for their locker room. "You heard her when she answered you. She wanted it this way, Steph. She thinks it looked better. It _did_ look better. I've been there myself at times. Sometimes when you believe in a match or a storyline enough, you'll put yourself on the line to get it over. You've seen me do it and you've given me the riot act over it. That's what Ronda did out there just now. She believes in this, and she was prepared to take that shot to make it better. You certainly have nothing to feel bad about. She'll be fine once the doctor fixes her up, cleans all that blood off of her and gets her to calm down. It looks worse than it is. Have a shower and change and then go see her. It'll all be okay, Steph, trust me."

"Alright," Stephanie nodded, still not looking particularly happy about how it had gone down. "At least it went over like we planned, I guess."

Hunter laughed. "Oh yeah, there's a real shit storm going on. It's got to be number one trend by now. Just wait until tomorrow night, that's really going to be something."


	5. Chapter 5

Hunter Helmsley raised a wine glass and clinked it against the one held by his wife. He wore a smile that felt as big as the one that Stephanie returned to him across the table looked. The annual post Wrestlemania party was always an extravagant and enjoyable event to celebrate the end of the two hardest months of the year for everyone at WWE. The thirty fourth edition of the biggest event in sports entertainment had gone over well as a whole, with the particular highlights being the Rousey - McMahon street fight because of its shock ending, a tornado tag team last man standing match for the WWE tag team titles which saw the defending champions Randy Orton and Roman Reigns take on Brock Lesnar and Sheamus, and the main event, in which WWE World Heavyweight Champion Cesaro had retained his title by beating Seth Rollins.

Unfortunately for Hunter and Stephanie, there were problems relating to two of those matches, which added a slightly sour note to the celebrations as far as they were concerned. The problems came in the form of injuries. Two people who had competed in those matches were at the local hospital rather than being at the party, joining in with the celebrations. Final diagnosis wasn't back from the hospital on either of them yet, but Hunter was able to make a guess on the basis of what he had seen.

Ronda Rousey had been sent to get checked out following a nasty chair shot that she had intentionally taken to the head, which looked like it may well have given her a concussion as well as the very obvious three inch long cut on the top left of her forehead. The injury to Sheamus looked to be a lot more serious. There seemed little doubt that the Irishman had suffered at least a separated shoulder after being pushed from the top rope through a table which had been set up on the floor. It was an unlucky injury, but there was a very real possibility that it could be even more serious than a separation. Either way, he was looking at a number of months on the sidelines.

Vince and Linda McMahon were both in attendance for the celebrations, and they were sharing the top table, which seated four, with Hunter and Stephanie. Hunter also clinked glasses with Linda and then Vince, who was also indulging himself with a few glasses of wine - a real rarity for him. Unsurprisingly, the conversation had flowed comfortably and easily between the family members over the three course meal, and was continuing to do so until Hunter felt his phone vibrating in his pocket. The name on the device's screen when he looked at it didn't surprise him. Seth Rollins was calling from the hospital. This would be an update on Ronda's condition.

"It's Rollins, I better take this," Hunter announced as he stood up. There would be no way to have a conversation on a cell phone in the remarkably noisy room. Quickly, Hunter walked across the room, weaving his way through the groups of his employees who had chosen to leave their tables after finishing their meals.

Watching her husband walk away, Stephanie shook her head slightly. Deep down, she knew that Ronda's injury was not really fault, but even so she felt guilty about it. "That girl is crazy," she sighed, using the word in the sense that Ronda might need some help rather than simply insulting her.

"What happened?" Vince asked, knowing that she was talking about Ronda. "I was surprised to see you swing the chair at her head."

Stephanie distractedly rubbed the bridge of her nose with her thumb. "She talked me into it, to be honest. We needed her to look like she was out of it for the finish to go over right, and she convinced me that a shot to the head was the only way to pull that off. I told her that there was no way that I was going to hit her in the head with a chair as we simply don't do that anymore, but she insisted that we needed it for the finish. To compromise, she said she would block it with her hands, so technically I wouldn't be hitting her in the head with it. Of course, when the time came, she made no attempt to block it and you saw what happened. God damn it."

"Don't upset yourself about it," Vince said. "If it was my decision, she'd have a large fine to go with that concussion."

* * *

As he pushed his way through a pair of double doors and stepped into a much quieter hallway, Hunter answered the call from Seth just before voice mail could pick up for him. "Hey, Seth. How's Ronda?"

Given that Hunter expected that the worst thing he would hear was that Ronda had a mild concussion - something that was hardly rare in wrestling - he was surprised by the obvious combination of concern and stress that came through in Seth's voice. "Uh, not good. She's, uh, pretty upset. Surprisingly, she got the all clear on concussion, but she's got whiplash. Her neck is really hurting her and it's kind of panicking her. You remember about the injury she had, right? Years back she fell of a horse..."

Seth had started to babble, so Hunter gently cut in. "I know about the horse riding accident and the neck injury, and I can see why another neck injury is scary for Ronda. I guess maybe she's a little more susceptible to whiplash because of her past injury? Whatever the reason, you need to go back to her. Thanks for calling me and letting me know. Pass on best wishes from me and Steph, yeah?"

Rather than saying goodbye or hanging up, Seth mumbled, "She's crying and shit, man. I don't know what to do."

Hunter thought for a moment to try and find the best thing to say. "Yeah you do," he said reassuringly. "You're her boyfriend, you know exactly what to do. You be there for her. You get her through this. Whiplash can be very painful, but it's something she _will_ recover from. Okay?"

"Yeah," Seth mumbled. "Sorry, Hunter. I'll see you tomorrow." With that, the call ended.

Hunter sighed as he dropped the phone back into his pants pocket. Hearing that Ronda was so upset had gotten to him a little, too. Over the years, he had sustained several career threatening injuries himself, so he knew what the mental anguish could be like. It was true that whiplash wasn't especially serious in itself, but he could definitely understand why the pain was making Ronda relive her previous more serious neck injury.

Hunter headed back to the table, where Stephanie was first to speak. "Is Ronda okay? Tell me I didn't give her a concussion?"

"For a start, don't go down that road," Hunter said as he took his seat beside Vince and shuffled it back closer to the table. "You didn't do this. Ronda didn't block the shot like she said she would. It was her fault she got hurt, not yours. But no, she doesn't have a concussion. She has whiplash."

"Whiplash?" Stephanie asked, surprised by the news. Then a realisation hit her and it made her blood run a little cold. "Oh God, she had that neck injury. This must be hard for her. I should call her or something."

Hunter had no intention of repeating what Seth had told him on the phone, knowing that it would only serve to upset Stephanie even more. Ronda had Seth with her. A call from Stephanie wasn't going to achieve anything that he couldn't. Hunter held up a hand to urge his wife to calm down. "She'll be okay, she's got Seth with her. Whiplash hurts, and she'll probably be out for a few weeks, but she'll recover just fine."

"If you're sure," Stephanie conceded hesitantly.

A slightly uneasy silence settled over the table as Hunter drank some of his wine and set the glass back down. "I guess we need to rethink our plans for tomorrow night," he said in an attempt to partially change the subject.

Vince emitted something which sounded like a combination of a grunt and a laugh. "So it begins." He obviously took some satisfaction in the proclamation.

Hunter half turned to look at his father in law. "What?"

"Rousey." Vince said the name as if the simple act of doing so might bring some of his recently eaten meal back into the world. "You've just signed her for three _years_ , and after only one match she's talked Steph into hitting her in the head with a chair, lied about blocking it, put herself in the hospital, injured herself _and_ ruined your creative. Whiplash is a month out at the absolute minimum."

"Vince." Linda drew her husband's name out slightly and said it with a tone that suggested that a kick under the table was going to be the next thing to happen if he carried on, but Vince was already on a roll. He completely ignored his wife and continued barraging Hunter.

"Three _years_ of this you've signed yourself up for. The woman is a total nightmare. No matter what storylines you write her in, what advice you give her or what you tell her to do, she'll always be the same. Did you forget the first time she worked for us? She alienated the rest of the women, she threw tantrums about creative, she even broke script for God's sake. Steph tried her best with her, talking with her and trying to help her get in line. You tried. Even I tried. Don't you remember me sitting down with her a few weeks after she found out that Rollins cheated on her? I went to her locker room and spent over an hour with her. We talked over all of the issues she had with the company, then we talked over the issues that I and the company had with her. When I walked out of there that day, we shook hands and I told her not to let us down again. She promised me that she wouldn't, and what happened the next week? The next damned week."

Hunter grimaced and closed his eyes for a second at the memory as Linda couldn't help herself asking, "What happened?"

"She missed the call time for Raw," Stephanie said, twirling her wine glass around between her fingers by its stem.

"That's what you're up against," Vince said to Hunter. "The woman can't help herself. She's got that huge following like she's a fucking cult leader or something, when all she really is is a tough looking woman with the biggest ego on the planet, and an atrocious attitude to go with it."

"That'll do, Vince," Linda said. "We're trying to celebrate a successful Wrestlemania and a successful year here. Hunter and Steph are doing a great job."

Vince drained his own wine glass and set it back down on the table a little too forcefully. "I know they are. I couldn't be more proud of either of you, but on this thing you've made a big mistake. I did what I had to do to get that poisonous woman out of this company, even falling on my own sword when the board demanded it. And you've gone and brought her back in."

Having listened to the entire exchange, Hunter had a determined look on his face as he firmly assured everyone at the table, "I can manage her. I _will_ manage her. I've already asked Ric to work with her. She doesn't know that I asked him, but he thinks he's making some small progress already. Her and Rollins are back together too. Ronda means money and ratings. She always has, we all know that. And it's even more true now with the movies and everything else. Again, I signed her, I'll manage her."

Linda took this opportunity to step in again. "Why don't we order another bottle of wine and change the subject?"

Looking across the table, Hunter saw a familiar gleam in Stephanie's eyes. She loved it when he took charge and spoke the way he just had. He was already looking forward to making his excuses so that they could head up to their room. There was only one way that this night and this celebration were going to end.

* * *

Seth knew something that not many other people knew. It had always surprised him, as it would anyone else who found out about it, but Ronda Rousey cried. In fact, she cried a lot. As far as Seth knew, she would only do it when she was alone or when she was with him, but he had seen it many times in their first relationship. Despite that, it had still been a shock when he had arrived at the hospital to see his girlfriend in such a state, especially as she had not seemed too bad when she had left the arena in an ambulance, which was a precaution that WWE insisted on with any kind of head injury.

Ric Flair had ridden to the hospital with Ronda as Seth had needed to compete in the Wrestlemania main event. Ric, Seth and the doctors had all repeatedly done their best to assure her that although whiplash was a painful and very unpleasant injury, it wasn't overly serious and it certainly wasn't permanent. Nothing that anyone had said had been able to calm her down. Eventually, her energy had seemed to start to fail her and only then had she stopped crying, virtually collapsing into Seth's arms where she had sobbed quietly into his chest until she seemed to be physically unable to cry anymore. It had been a truly horrible experience for Seth, and as he climbed into their hotel room bed beside her, he was just glad to see that she wasn't crying.

"Are you okay?" he asked softly as he wrapped an arm around her and pulled her tightly to him, knowing that the question sounded stupid.

Ronda spoke rapidly, sounding almost panicked. "I can't do this. I can't go there again. I can't. I can't do it. Not another neck injury."

"Shhhh. Shhhh." Seth urged, stroking her hair away from her face and looking into her eyes. "Look at me. You're going to be okay. I know your neck hurts a lot right now, but this is whiplash you have. This isn't like before. You're not going back to anywhere. You're going to be okay, I promise."

He saw Ronda's eyes fill with tears again as she said, "But I was going to do it to her. I was going to put her through something like that on purpose. What type of animal am I?"

Confused, Seth said, "I don't know what you're talking about, babe."

"I was going to hurt May on purpose," Ronda blurted out. "I was going to wait until we were in a match against each other and I was going to kick her as hard as I could in the side of her knee and finish her career. And for what? What the fuck is wrong with me?"

The revelation shocked Seth. "You were going to deliberately cripple May? Why? What the hell for? I already finished with her and I'm back with you, aren't I?"

Ronda closed her eyes, as if merely looking at Seth was a task which was too difficult to accomplish while talking about this. "I don't fucking know. I just hate her. Hated her, I mean. I don't know. I've been miserable for two years and she's been happy. It's not fucking fair. That's what I've been telling myself, that she owed me for two years of unhappiness. She took you away from me and it ruined my life."

"That's fucked up," Seth breathed, immediately regretting his choice of words. "May didn't _take_ me away from you. You and I ruined our relationship before May ever came on the scene. I know I slept with her... Look, we've already been over all of this. What happened is on us, not May, and you can't go around using wrestling matches as a way to inflict serious injuries on people you don't get along with. That's just... It's fucked up."

"My entire life is fucked up," Ronda gasped out and began to cry yet again. "People think that being famous and having money means everything is great, but it doesn't. I hate my life. At least until I got back with you I hated it. I'm up there with the most recognisable women in the world, yet I felt so lonely all the time. It's not just that, either. I can't help myself doing stupid shit. Look at when I was with WWE the first time. How many times did you or Steph sit down with me and talk to me about how it was time I cut the shit and get my head in the game? I'd always be determined to do it, too, but then something would happen and I'd be back to square one. I couldn't help myself. What if I do it again and it tears us apart like it did last time? I can't go there again, Seth. I can't..." Her voice trailed off and she closed her eyes again.

Seth wiped a tear from her cheek. His mind was reeling as he tried to keep up with everything she had just said. For the first time, he truly realised that Ronda didn't just have attitude problems; she had problems that were much more legitimate and much more serious than that. But what to do about it? She had just acknowledged that she wanted to essentially turn her life around, but would she balk at the suggestion of getting professional help? Was professional help even what was needed? Seth was by no means an expert on mental health issues, however he felt almost certain that someone like Ronda would see weakness in asking for help. It was a difficult spot to find himself in. At that moment, Hunter's words on the phone earlier in the night came back to him. They had been talking about whiplash at the time, but what he had said still applied.

" _You're her boyfriend, you know exactly what to do. You be there for her. You get her through this_."

Seth knew that he could bail if he wanted to. He didn't have to get involved in this shit. It was a matter of weighing up what Ronda meant to him against how much stress and hard work this could potentially end up being. He told himself that there was no decision to make. It was time to step up and be there for the woman he loved. She was a long way from perfect in many respects, but he loved her, and that was what mattered. That was _all_ that mattered. Softly, he kissed Ronda's forehead. "We'll get you some help, honey. I don't know what the first step is, but we'll figure it out, okay?"

There was no reply. Ronda's exhaustion had sent her to sleep in his arms.

"I love you," Seth whispered. He sensed that he might be about to begin a journey on a long road, but he would stay on that road until the end, wherever it might lead.


	6. Chapter 6

"Therapy? What for?" Ronda had turned away from the hotel room's huge mirror and looked at Seth with a confused expression on her face as she continued brushing her hair. Her sleepily delivered concerns from the previous night about her attitude problems ruining their relationship for a second time seemed to have been forgotten about. She clearly considered the suggestion of therapy to be ridiculous.

That had been on Monday morning, the day after Wrestlemania. Seth had known then and there, with those three words, that he was facing a much bigger uphill battle than he had first imagined when he had realised that Ronda possibly had a genuine psychological condition rather than a large ego and attitude problems. "Remember what you said last night before you fell asleep?" he had prompted gently from his sitting position on the end of the king size double bed. "What you said about your attitude causing problems between us like it did last time?"

"Yeah, I remember. Of course I do," Ronda replied, sounding as though she thought Seth was stretching her words a bit far beyond their original meaning. "I know what I said and I meant it. I'm trying to improve my attitude. I already told you that. Since I started to get to know Ric, he's been helping me with that. He's been really good to me. He says that in some ways I remind him of his daughter, Charlotte. According to Ric, she could have gotten into WWE if she'd wanted to, but she got married and opened a gym with her husband. Ric would like me to meet her one day, so that should be good."

Seth hadn't wanted to talk about Ric Flair's daughter at that moment in time. He hadn't wanted to let the subject be changed at all. "That's good, babe, that Ric's helping you and that you guys are getting along great, but I'd really like you to at least talk to someone about this thing. If you don't have anything that requires therapy or treatment then they'll tell you that, right?"

The discussion had gone on for several more minutes, but Ronda was adamant; she wasn't going to therapy because she didn't 'have a condition or anything stupid like that.'

That had been four weeks ago. Seth and Ronda had hardly seen each other in person during that period, largely thanks to WWE's tour of Europe which Seth was required to be a key part of. Ronda had not been booked on the tour, but even if she had been, she would have been ruled out of it by her whiplash injury. The timing of the tour could hardly have been any less convenient for Seth as far as helping Ronda with her possible condition as well the stress and anxiety that her whiplash had caused was concerned. He had brought up the subject of therapy several times during their frequent phone calls, but she had continued to be dismissive when it came to the possibility of speaking to someone professionally, saying that she didn't need a therapist to tell her when she was in the wrong. The only things she would acknowledge were that she had to improve her attitude towards WWE, which she said she was already working on, and that she had been in the wrong in planning to deliberately hurt May Devany during a match. She claimed that she never would have actually gone through with it, but Seth strongly suspected otherwise. At least with those admissions, Seth could feel like some small amount of progress was being made.

The European tour had given Seth more than enough time alone in boring hotel rooms to do some research online. A condition called Narcissistic Personality Disorder, referred to as NPD, was his best guess at a diagnosis as to what Ronda might have. One of the things he had read repeatedly seen when studying the condition was that people who had it would often never be treated for it because they would simply refuse to acknowledge that they even had a problem. That definitely seemed to fit with how she was acting.

Seth had spoken to Maggie about what Ronda had told him on the night of Wrestlemania and voiced his suspicions relating to NPD. After promising to be as diplomatic as possible, Maggie had agreed to also try her best to talk Ronda into at least speaking to a doctor for a professional opinion. It was no real surprise to either of them that Ronda had proceeded to laugh the suggestion off, telling Maggie not to be stupid.

"What the hell are we going to do?" Seth had asked Maggie frustratedly during a late night phone call from a hotel room in Germany.

"I really don't think she's going to go to see anyone about it, and we can't force her," Maggie had replied. "If that's the case, I think we just need and try to manage her. It sounds awful to put it like that, but you know what I mean. You've looked NPD up online the same as I have. You've probably read exactly the same articles that I have about the different types of narcissism. If she does have it, Ronda is what they call a grandiose narcissist. They believe in their own greatness, and in some cases are almost as good as they believe they are. She thinks she's the best female wrestler in the world, and let's be honest, she's definitely up there. I really don't like talking about her like this, Seth. She's having a hard enough time with the whiplash. The PT and massages are helping a lot, but she still gets upset about it."

"I know she does," Seth had sighed. "But we're talking about this stuff because we care about her. I think you're right that she won't go see someone, but that leaves a problem. What do I do about WWE? Do I go tell Hunter and Steph that I think she has NPD and that means they need to cut her some slack if she goes off the deep end or does something stupid? I just don't see that being a good idea."

Maggie had thought for a moment. "I don't know, honestly. They're your bosses. I've only met them a couple of times, and only then to say a quick hello. I think it would probably be for the best to tell them, but if you don't think they'd be understanding about it then maybe not? It's something you'll have to think about. It's your call."

Seth had thought about it. He had thought about it a lot before eventually deciding not to say anything to the bosses for now. Instead he would do his best to help Ronda keep herself grounded himself. Only if something happened to put her in the bad books with WWE despite his efforts would he take the significant step of voicing his suspicions regarding NPD to Hunter or Stephanie. Talking about his girlfriend like that to their bosses seemed fundamentally wrong to him, plus the conversation, if it happened, would be a very awkward one. He also knew that Ronda would go wild if she found out that he had said something like that about her behind her back.

The whiplash injury that Ronda had sustained at Wrestlemania was actually not serious. In fact, it had hurt her mentally at least as much as it had physically. When writing their storyline for her, WWE's creative team had been informed that four weeks to recover from whiplash was very optimistic, therefore plans had needed to be altered not only for the lead up to the Extreme Rules pay-per-view, but also for the event itself. Eventually they had put together a way to get the outcome that they wanted with only a minimal contribution from Ronda. It would then be relatively simple to give her another couple of weeks without matches until the medical staff agreed that she was fully fit to wrestle.

As he sat in his locker room backstage at Extreme Rules, thinking back over all of these events and conversations, Seth unconsciously rubbed at his beard with his hand. Just getting to see Ronda was great. The fact that she was almost healed and was back at work was even better. However, it did mean that tonight was the first night he had to be sure to keep half an eye out for her and any shit that she might potentially get herself into. The whole thing felt very strange and awkward, almost like he was taking on the role of a minder for a grown woman, and his own girlfriend at that. Adding to his sense of unease was that Ronda had been summoned to the production office to go over the final outline for the match that she was to be involved in later in the night. What if she kicked off about it and caused a scene?

"How did it go?" he asked with a hint of nervousness in his voice when Ronda walked back into the locker room a few minutes later. She had smiled as she entered, but that was no guarantee of anything.

Without missing a beat Ronda replied, "I told Steph to kiss my ass and Hunter to fuck himself."

Fortunately for Seth, he was able to tell that she was joking. "Very funny. So you got it all worked out?"

"Don't do that, Seth," Ronda sighed. "You're my boyfriend, not my dad. I don't need you treating me like a kid. I know I have a temper and I'm keeping it under control, alright? I meant it when I said I don't want this to go the same way as last time, with you or with WWE. I've already told Hunter that he writes the creative and I wrestle the matches. I've got the message."

Seth stood and they exchanged a brief and delicate kiss. "Okay," he smiled. "Sorry. I'm just trying to be there for you, but you're right, I'll take a step back. If you have a problem with someone though, talk to me first, okay?"

Ronda laughed. "You or Ric. I got two sitters looking out for me. Am I really that much hard work?"

"Yes," Seth grinned.

Ronda gave him a punch on the shoulder, but she was grinning as she did it. "Asshole."

"Ow!" Seth groaned, rubbing at his shoulder. "I'm going to do something about those fists of yours one day."

"I'd like to see you try."

Trying to keep his mind out of the gutter, Seth changed the subject. "Let's go eat. I'm starving."

He made for the door and Ronda joined him, taking his hand, but she didn't let him off the hook. "Yeah, you change the subject."

Seth glanced at her and shrugged. Despite his efforts, his mind was in the gutter. "Well, if you want to _force_ me into breaking out the duct tape and tying you up, I can do. It's not going to be me that suffers."

"Want to make a bet?" Ronda laughed. "I can get physical with the best of them."

"True, but you know who your daddy is," Seth quipped and rapidly scooted out of the way before another punch could connect with him. At that moment Roman, Dean and Renee walked out of a locker room a short distance up ahead, talking among themselves. Seth jogged towards them and called out, "Hey! Do something! She's punching me!"

All three spun around to face in his direction. "What, again?" Renee mumbled under her breath.

Roman laughed. "Aren't you supposed to play the coward _on_ TV?"

Seth was about to retort as he reached the group, but Dean moved quickly and grabbed him, spinning him around and pinning his arms behind his back. "Go on, girl. Have a free shot on me," he invited Ronda as she approached. "Make it a good one."

"Get off me, you prick," Seth giggled, struggling, but getting nowhere.

"Stomach or face?" Ronda asked Dean with a grin.

Roman jumped in. "Face. Couldn't make the fucking thing look any worse."

Everyone laughed at that, but Renee was noticeably less enthusiastic. "As if I could do that," Ronda said, pretending like she was talking about deliberately backing her car over a dog or something equally dreadful. She leaned in and planted a kiss on Seth's lips instead.

When she pulled away, Dean released Seth and shoved him in her direction. "Take him then, if you want him. Just don't let me see any more of that kissing shit."

The banter continued as the group walked along the hallway towards catering. When they arrived, they paused in the doorway and surveyed the scene. The room was incredibly busy and there was a line of people waiting their turn to load up their trays up with food. "Fuck," Dean groaned. "Look at this. We'll be here half the fucking night. I told you we should have come down here sooner."

"Can we tone the language down just a little?" Renee asked, her tone neither angry or unpleasant, simply making a request.

Ronda looked at Seth and managed to put an incredible amount of sarcasm into the way that she silently mouthed a repetition of what Renee had said.

"Stop it. You're supposed to be making an effort here," Seth mumbled to her as Dean replied to Renee.

"I am making an effort. I didn't tell her to fuck off, did I?" Ronda mumbled back. She then moved on to saying something to Roman while the group walked over to join the back of the line. Seth once more found himself considering that there was a long road to travel with Ronda before she managed to drop her attitude problems, if she ever managed it at all.

* * *

 _ **Extreme Rules 2018**_

After plugging the WWE Network, Byron Saxton moved on to building up to the next match, the fourth on the card. "Next up, we have a very interesting contest. Last month, at Wrestlemania, Brock Lesnar and Sheamus defeated Randy Orton and Roman Reigns to become the new WWE Tag Team Champions. Unfortunately, Sheamus suffered a serious shoulder injury during that match and is expected to be out for around six months. It seemed obvious that WWE Chairwoman Stephanie McMahon would have to order that Brock Lesnar and Sheamus would therefore be made to relinquish their titles, but John, that's not what happened."

"No it isn't," JBL smiled back at his partner, clearly delighted about the fact. "Mrs McMahon has more sense than to try and make Brock Lesnar give up a title. She would have had to have been foolish to do that, and we all can agree that the boss is definitely not foolish. That's why we're about to see Brock Lesnar defend the Tag Team Championship against Orton and Reigns, who have exercised their right to a rematch. But will Lesnar be defending the titles alone?"

"Not if you believe Stephanie McMahon, he won't," Saxton said, turning back to face the camera. "This past week, we saw her tell Paul Heyman that she was 'sure' that Lesnar would have a partner here tonight, and that it would be someone she is very close to personally. I have no idea what that means, but let's take a look at how all of this went down."

With that, the video promo for the upcoming match began.

* * *

Surprisingly, the tag team match, which was in reality a two on one handicap match, had been a very even contest. No matter how many frequent tags Orton and Reigns managed to make and how much they tried to beat down Lesnar, he was relentless in getting back up for more. Not only that, he was giving as good as he got. Eventually, Brock had even managed to isolate Orton in the ring and had delivered his signature German suplex five times consecutively.

Brock went for a sixth suplex, but this time Orton fought out of the waist lock by elbowing Brock several times in the face. Reacting on instinct, Lesnar shoved Randy forwards and into the ropes. Hitting the ropes, Orton ran back at Lesnar, launching himself at the former UFC star, only to find himself caught in the perfect position for an F5.

"F5! That's going to be all!" JBL yelled over the thunderous impact on the canvas as Lesnar hit the move. There was no opportunity for him to make a cover though, because as he got to his feet, Reigns ran into the ring and connected with a huge Spear, sending both men through the middle rope and out to the floor in front of the commentary tables. The crowd cheered the powerful move loudly as Saxton said, "That's why it's called Extreme Rules! Reigns is putting it all on the line to regain those tag team titles."

"It might have been worth it, if it had even kept Lesnar down," JBL said.

Reigns was fresh, but even so Lesnar was getting up just as quickly, albeit looking groggy. Reigns reacted the faster when the two men regained their feet and launched himself into the air, connecting with a huge punch to Lesnar's face. "Superman punch!" Saxton yelled as Lesnar fell backwards onto the commentary table. "Lesnar's out of it!"

Next, Reigns climbed onto the commentary table and began to lift Lesnar up. "What's Reigns going to do here?" Saxton asked.

Suddenly, Brock exploded back into life and hoisted Roman up onto his shoulders while standing on the table. JBL yelled, "He's going to take an F5! That's what he's going to do!"

"Not through the table!" Saxton pleaded as he ran away towards the time keeper's position. Lesnar launched Roman into the air and sent him flying through the Spanish announce table with an F5. As Lesnar landed on Saxton and JBL's table it also gave way, leaving the champion and one of his challengers both lying on the concrete floor among the shattered remains of two commentary tables. The Spanish commentators were also down, having had Roman land on them after going through the table.

"It looks like a war zone out here!" JBL called out. "And where's my hat gone, damn it?"

"Forget your hat. All three men involved in the match are down. We've got bodies and wreckage everywhere out here at ringside. Now what's going to happen?"

With perfect timing, the crowd began to boo loudly. The camera shot changed to show the stage, revealing that Stephanie McMahon had just walked out through the curtain. She wore the typical 'I know something that you don't' smirk that fans saw from her so often as she raised her microphone. Suspiciously, she held a sledgehammer in her other hand. "Ladies and gentlemen, I said I was sure that Brock Lesnar would have a partner here tonight, and that it would be someone I'm very close to personally."

Stephanie lowered the microphone and the crowd was almost reduced to silence as they waited to see who the partner was going to be. Most of them assumed that it was going to be a return for Triple H. They were wrong. The sound of a jet fighter flying past with afterburners lit filled the arena, followed by the theme music for Wasteland. The crowd erupted.

"Wait! Ronda Rousey?" Saxton asked incredulously as the former Divas champion walked out onto the stage, dressed in her usual black ring attire. She waked over to Stephanie McMahon and the two women smiled at each other as they exchanged a fist bump. Stephanie then made a great show of handing the hammer to Ronda. "I don't understand! McMahon beat Rousey at Wrestlemania, and now she's handing her a sledgehammer? What are we seeing here? Are they on the same page? How? Why? Is Rousey in this match?"

From the stage, Stephanie announced, "This match is now no disqualification."

Ronda was now walking towards the ring with her familiar expression of steely determination on her face. "She don't look like she's coming down here to do commentary," JBL said gleefully. "This is brilliance on the part of Stephanie McMahon. The match is no DQ and her comes Rousey with a sledgehammer."

As Ronda rolled into the ring and began to line up the wounded Orton with the hammer, her music faded out as Saxton asked, "Can a woman even be a Tag Team Champion?"

"I'm happy to watch you go in there and tell her she can't," JBL quipped.

The crowd were obviously unsure what exactly they were seeing, or why Ronda would possibly have decided to align herself with Stephanie, so they were cheering her regardless. Orton stumbled to his feet and turned around. Ronda swung the hammer as hard as she could and buried it into his stomach. Even though Orton and Reigns were the face team, the crowd cheered loudly as he crumpled to the floor. Ronda tossed the hammer aside and made a cover. The crowd joined in with the count.

"One!"

"Two!"

"Three!"

Saxton yelled over the cheering, "It's over, but what, what's the decision? Are Rousey and Lesnar..."

Stephanie helped him out from the stage by filling in for Lillian Garcia. "Your winners, and WWE Tag Team Champions, Brock Lesnar, and Ronda Rousey!"

Paul Heyman was shown crouched down beside the fallen body of Lesnar. He had apparently been trying to encourage his client to get back up, but now he was simply staring back into the ring with a very confused expression on his face. In the ring, Ronda snatched one of the title belts from the referee and rolled out of the ring without bothering to celebrate in any way.

"Rousey and Lesnar are the Tag Team Champions!" Saxton cried out. "We've got our first ever female Tag Team Champion! Rousey and Lesnar are together! Are Rousey and Heyman together? Are Rousey and _McMahon_ together? Surely that can't be true?"

Ronda had already stormed up the ramp and was now standing triumphantly beside Stephanie. Stephanie beamed like the Cheshire Cat as she raised Ronda's hand in victory. Ronda held up her newly acquired title belt in her other hand. Now the crowd did manage some boos, although there were also a lot of people still cheering.

"Has Ronda Rousey sold out?" JBL mumbled, sounding unsure of himself. "Why would she do that?"

He and the WWE Universe would have to wait for that answer because the shot faded to black and a video promo for NXT began.


	7. Chapter 7

The weather in Honolulu, Hawaii on Wednesday morning was stunning. There wasn't a cloud in the sky and the temperature was already soaring as Seth walked slowly out of the lobby of the hotel where he and Ronda were staying. Glancing back at the building, he considered that being a wrestler was definitely one of the strangest jobs in the world. What other job was there which could make sustaining an injury be considered a _good_ thing, as long as the injury was a minor one?

At Extreme Rules, Seth had been required to perform his signature Phoenix Splash, with his opponent rolling out of the way, leaving Seth to land on his feet. Unfortunately, in doing so, Seth's knee had twisted slightly upon landing. He had been able to finish the match despite the pain, but his knee had swollen up slightly. After a thorough examination and a scan, it was determined that there was no serious damage to the knee, but it would be best for Seth not to wrestle for a week as a precaution. With the fact that Ronda was only contractually obliged to work Raw, it meant that there was an incredibly rare opportunity for them to take a vacation together, even if it would only be for a few days.

Although the vacation was going to be short, it had still cost Seth a small fortune. Booking a palatial hotel suite in one of the most expensive hotels on the island at the last minute was never likely to come cheap. He remembered back to something that he had said to Ronda the previous night when their bottle of champagne had been delivered to the room. "If what they charge for the rooms here is steep, the room service prices are fucking vertical!" It had been a joke, but Ronda had responded by doing the same thing that she had done about almost everything since they had set off for the airport back in the US: complaining.

The list of complaints seemed never ending to Seth. Everything ranging from the airport being too busy, to people bugging them for signatures, to the seat on the plane being uncomfortable. All of that was before they even reached the hotel, which Ronda had also seen fit to bitch about. Even the ridiculously expensive suite hadn't been enough to make her happy. The previous night, Seth had actually considered yelling at her, "Just fucking be happy, will you?" Despite how little sense it would have made, he had nearly done it.

If there was at least one thing that Seth could take from the unpleasant experience, it was that he no longer had even a shadow of doubt that Ronda had NPD. This certainty didn't make her complaints and lack of appreciation any less hurtful and annoying, but it did give him renewed determination to talk her into seeking professional help and ultimately getting treatment. The question was how? How to talk Ronda into seeing someone when she had already refused and laughed off the idea?

Then, over a room service breakfast that morning, Ronda had said something that had set Seth's brain to work on an idea. When asked what she would like to do during the day, Ronda had suggested scuba diving. She was a certified diver and it was something that she really enjoyed doing. Despite Seth's knee injury, she had begun to try and talk him into joining her and trying a dive for the first time. "You'd really love it," she had said enthusiastically, which in itself was a pleasant change from being sullen for most of the vacation up to that point. "It's such a relaxing thing to do. You just feel so calm when you're down there, so at peace. It's wonderful."

After breakfast, Ronda had headed for the shower. Knowing how long she would always take in there, Seth had taken the opportunity to head out and look for a boat to charter so that she could dive, in the hope that it would finally make her happy. He had decided not to join her, largely because of his bad knee, but also because he had no experience of diving and wasn't convinced that he would be comfortable with it. All he wanted from the day was for Ronda to enjoy herself and come out of the water totally relaxed and chilled out. That was when he would take the opportunity to bring up the subject of therapy again, at the ideal moment. If he was still unable to get through to her then, he had a serious problem on his hands, but he would worry about crossing that bridge if and when he came to it.

There was a harbour not far from the hotel. Seth had seen it when they had driven past it on the way to the hotel from the airport the previous day. It only took him a few minutes to walk there, and although he did so slowly so as not to put strain on his knee, he felt himself sweating under the baking hot sun despite the fact that he was only wearing shorts, flip flops and a pair of sunglasses. Upon arriving at the harbour, Seth saw a scuba equipment rental store further down the street on the opposite side.

"Perfect," he mumbled to himself and proceeded to walk along the harbour front, looking for a boat available for charter. Some of the moorings were already empty. Clearly there were plenty of early risers around who liked to get up and get out there. Up ahead, he saw a sign advertising a diving charter. The large white boat that was moored beside it looked to be in mint condition. It's paintwork literally gleamed in the sun. Judging by the size of the boat, it was designed to be leased by large groups of divers rather than a couple, but Seth knew that it would impress Ronda to go out on something so extravagant. It was worth the expense. He walked along the harbour front until he reached the boat. As he arrived, a middle aged blonde man had just gotten off the boat. He was definitely not a native Hawaiian. "Is this your boat?" Seth asked.

"Sure is," the man smiled. Seth guessed his accent to be Australian.

"I'd like to, uh, hire you for a few hours today, if possible?" Seth asked, feeling awkward as he didn't know if he was using the correct terminology.

The man shook his head. "Sorry, mate. I'm booked all day today. Just waiting for my clients to come back with their gear. I can fit you in tomorrow?"

"I need someone for today," Seth said pleasantly, despite his disappointment. "No worries. Have a good one." He began to walk away, but only made it a couple of paces before the man spoke again.

"How many people in your party, mate?"

Seth turned back to face him. "Just me and my girlfriend. It'll only be her diving."

The man nodded. "Try the next boat along. You won't go wrong with Adam."

Seth turned once more and looked at the boat in question. His first thought was that it was a lot smaller than the one he was currently standing beside. It was well presented, but that didn't totally hide the fact that the boat had seen better days. A young, muscular blonde man was on-board. He had his back to Seth, but it appeared that he was polishing one of the boat's guard rails. Unconvinced and unimpressed by the boat's appearance, Seth turned back to the man he had been speaking to. "That guy any good?"

"Yeah," the man smiled broadly. "He's also my son. He's not been set up on his own for very long, but he worked with me doing this since he was a boy. He knows what he's doing, and he knows all the best dive sites around here. Tell him I sent you."

After thanking the man, Seth walked along to the next boat and called out, "Adam?"

"That's me." The man who looked to be in his early twenties stopped polishing and turned to look at Seth. "Help you mate?" He began to walk towards the boat's short gangway.

"I'm looking to charter a boat for a few hours so that my girlfriend can dive. I was just back there talking to your dad. He says you're the guy I need and that you might be available."

"He was right about both of those things," Adam smiled broadly as he walked up the gangway. He held his hand out to Seth. "Adam Watson."

"Seth Rollins." The two men shook hands firmly.

"You said it's just your girlfriend looking to dive?"

"Right," Seth nodded. "I'm resting a knee injury, so I'm just going to chill on the boat while she's down there. I've never dived before anyway, but she's certified and experienced."

"Sounds good," Adam said. "I'll need to dive with her as her buddy, but that's not a problem." The two men moved on to talking price. When Seth began to walk back towards the hotel a couple of minutes later, he felt proud of his negotiating skills. Adam felt proud of his own. It was one thing to sell something for an expensive price, but it was another to sell at the expensive price _and_ have the client think that they'd bagged themselves a great deal.

Seth took out his phone and called Ronda. It only took two rings for her to answer. "Hey. Where did you vanish to?" she asked.

"I walked down to the harbor," Seth revealed. "I've got us a boat for a few hours so that we can go out and you can dive. Apparently there has to be two of you, so the guy I spoke to is going to dive with you. I said I wanted to rest my knee. Anyway, he said he knows all of the best spots around here. It should be perfect for you. There's a place down here where you can rent some gear. I'm walking back to the hotel now, so I'll meet you in the lobby if you're ready?"

"That's really sweet of you," Ronda said, actually sounding like she meant it and was happy. "Thank you. I'll head down to the lobby now. I can't wait!"

"Love you, babe," Seth said, smiling broadly, feeling like he had actually achieved something at last.

"Love you too."

It took Seth a few minutes to get back to the hotel. When he walked into the lobby, he saw Ronda waiting for him. She smiled and walked quickly over. "Hey now," she greeted him, clearly making a reference to the way he was dressed. "My man's looking good today."

They exchanged a brief kiss. "Only today?" Seth asked, pretending to be offended and making a point of looking over Ronda's figure in her white tank top and very short jean shorts. "My woman looks stunning _every_ day."

"Okay, _especially_ good today. Better?" Ronda giggled as they walked out of the hotel hand in hand. With her other hand she removed her Oakley sunglasses from the top of her head and put them on properly. Oakley was the second company which Ronda had been made the face of, along with Adidas. Still, Seth reasoned, he had gotten a two hundred and fifty dollar pair of sunglasses for nothing, and they were really good too, not just designer crap for the sake of being designer crap.

"Much," he grinned in response to her question. They crossed the street outside of the hotel, weaving through the very slow moving traffic. Seth raised a hand to acknowledge a driver who had waved them across.

"Fuck's sake, how hot is it?" Ronda moaned when they reached the other side of the street. "I know we're on vacation, but this is like being in a greenhouse."

"Could be worse, could be raining," Seth said, brushing off the latest complaint.

"Hmmm," Ronda mumbled dismissively. "Well, I was checking my Twitter while I waited for you. I got some abuse from the marks, so the heel turn has started to take, after Monday. I must admit, when Hunter decided to change things up and have Lesnar _not_ want me as his partner I was a lot less than convinced, but it made the angle with Steph better. What better way to have people lose respect for the best female wrestler in the world than to have that wrestler say that she deliberately asked her much weaker opponent to give her a finishing move and then lay down for her? To deliberately lose goes against everything a competitive athlete stands for. It's repulsive. For the purpose we intended it, it's perfect, especially with Steph gaining control of the company because of it."

The way that Ronda called herself the best female wrestler in the world without even so much as a thought wasn't lost on Seth. The time to confront her on that kind of thing would come later. For now, he ignored it and went with, "It would have been cool to see you wrestle one of the guys though, even it was just once. Having you stand on the apron and then refuse to tag Lesnar as he goes on to lose seems like a wasted opportunity to me."

Ronda shrugged. "It is what it is. The fans will hate it that I don't get in there. Everyone wants to see me get in there and knock Orton the fuck out, whether I'm supposed to be a heel or not. Personally? I don't need to wrestle with guys. Aside from Brock, I could kick anyone's ass in WWE, and they know it too. Being big means nothing if you come up against a real fighter."

For Seth, the conversation was becoming almost unbearable. Everything seemed to end up in arrogance and boasting. Love Ronda or not, he couldn't go on like this indefinitely. He figured that no one had _that_ much patience. "Damn. I forgot, the scuba rental place is on the other side of the street. We need to cross again," he said, reasoning that getting Ronda to focus back on diving was the best course of action for now.

It worked. They crossed the street and arrived at the store a minute or so later. Seth stood beside Ronda and tried to look like he had a clue about what was going on while she picked out the gear she wanted. At least the fact that he put the charge on his American Express card generated a smile from her. With that taken care of, they headed out of the store and across the street yet again, this time walking towards the row of moorings, most of which were now empty. Seth carried the scuba tank while Ronda carried the rest of the gear, including a wetsuit.

"Which boat is ours?" she asked as they reached the other side of the street. She looked around at the very limited options. There were three in total.

"Right there," Seth said, pointing at Adam's boat with his free hand as he headed off towards it.

Ronda paused for a second before following him. Seth immediately knew what was going to come next: more complaining. He was right. "That thing?" she whined. "What did you do, ask around for who had the crappiest boat?"

Seth's temper was now being severely tested, but he kept his cool and his voice remained calm. "No. What I asked around for was a captain who knew the best dive sites around here, like I said before. This guy was recommended to me. Used to do this with his old man, apparently, but now he's started up on his own."

"Right," Ronda acknowledged and then glanced at Seth. "Let's hope we don't sink before we get back." This time her grin told Seth that she was joking.

"I'm trying, babe," Seth said, wondering why he felt the need to say it even as did so. Suddenly it felt very important to him for Ronda to express some kind of gratitude for his efforts.

"I know." The words sounded appreciative, but it still wasn't actually the thank you that Seth had hoped for. Again, he was surprised by how much it hurt.

They had reached the gangway to Adam's boat by this point. Seth headed across first, calling out a hello to Adam as he did so. The captain walked around the boat's bow from the other side of what Seth guessed was called the wheelhouse. It seemed like a boating term that he recognised from somewhere. He knew the front was the bow, that was for sure.

"All set, mate?" Adam asked loudly, his enthusiasm coming through clearly.

"Yep," Seth agreed as he stepped aside for Ronda to come on-board behind him. "Let me introduce you to my girlfriend..."

"Ronda Rousey!" Adam exclaimed as he set eyes on her. "Oh shit! I mean, uh, excuse me. Great to meet you! Welcome on-board. Name's Adam, Adam Watson."

Ronda had her hands full, so she offered her left elbow for a makeshift fist bump of sorts, which Adam accepted. "What's up?" Ronda beamed. "Nice boat. So, you know the best dive sites around here, I'm told?"

"Sure do," Adam nodded. Seth sighed inwardly at the fangirl expression on his face. He now had visions of this entire trip consisting of Ronda's ego getting a whole lot more food to devour. Why did this guy have to know who she was, and be a fan of her? Adam had turned to Seth. "You're the wrestler dude. I thought you looked familiar for some reason."

 _Yeah, I'm "wrestler dude". She's Ronda "oh shit" Rousey. Ain't it great? She has NPD and if I'm not careful you're going to make it go into overdrive by the time this trip is over. For fuck's sake. And "Nice boat?" You've changed your tune pretty quick, babe, now that you know the guy's a fan of yours. What a surprise that is._

"Right," Seth managed to smile, but he let his tone convey that he wasn't best pleased. "How about we get this show on the road, huh?"

"Yeah, sorry," Adam said, seemingly remembering that he was being paid to do a job rather than attending a meet and greet. While Adam took the dive gear and stowed it safely, Seth lead Ronda to the comfortable seat right at the back of the boat. He had no intention of letting this develop the way that he could easily imagine if she and Adam really got chatting.

At least Adam had the decency to concentrate on driving the boat and leave his clients to chat in private as they headed for the dive site. For fifteen minutes, the conversation was pleasant. Seth sat with an arm around Ronda and she relaxed into him as they talked. Finally, he felt at ease himself. This was how he wanted their relationship to be all the time, not to just have mere fleeting glimpses of it. It wasn't that he wanted to change Ronda. When they had first met, things had been great. It was only when she overcame her neck injury and debuted as a wrestler that things began to get out of control. If she would actually get therapy or medication, whatever was required to help her manage her NPD, Seth knew that things really could be great again for them.

"Nearly there, guys," Adam called out.

It was Ronda's cue to put on her wetsuit and then the rest of her gear. "Hmmm, sexy," Seth grinned when she had the suit on.

"Shut up," Ronda giggled. "No one looks good in a wetsuit."

Seth pretended to consider that carefully. "I disagree," he said a few moments later. He began to help her with getting the scuba tank on her back.

"I still can't believe that prick Ziggler," Ronda said sourly, as if from nowhere. "Or his fucking midget girlfriend. I know she put him up to it."

Seth knew exactly what she was talking about. Late Monday night, when they had been enjoying an intimate moment, Dolph Ziggler had banged loudly on their hotel room door and shouted a thank you to Seth for being a douche bag. He had been referring to the way that Seth had broken off his relationship with May Devany, who, it now seemed, was dating Ziggler. "The guy's a cock, always has been," Seth said dismissively. "Whether May had anything to do with it or not, just ignore them, especially Ziggler. He thinks he's funny. Don't let it get to you, especially while we're on vacation."

The sound of the boat's engine faded and it began to slow. Ronda sat on the edge of the boat and began to put the black fins onto her feet. "Only one thing's funny about Ziggler; the fact that he considers what he's got to be a career. The fucking guy has been in WWE for how long and he's only been champion once. _Once_ in all that time, and even then it was for like a month or whatever. I'd have more self respect to be honest."

"Like I said, forget the pair of them," Seth urged, trying to stop her from getting even further worked up. He definitely wasn't going to point out the Dolph had been WWE Champion more than once. "We're here to enjoy ourselves."

"I know", Ronda sighed, "But those pair of idiots really get under my skin. I mean, we were in our _own_ hotel room. Who fucking does something like that?"

Seth said nothing as she proceeded with checking that the scuba tank and regulator were working correctly. With the boat now anchored, Adam walked over with a smile on his face. "This should be perfect for you, Ronda." He picked up the dive mask that she had placed beside her and examined it. To Seth it simply looked like any other dive mask, made from black plastic and silicone, but Adam nodded in recognition. "Nice choice. Seac L70. I have one of these myself. You know how to pick your gear."

It was no surprise to Seth that Ronda smiled broadly as her ego devoured yet more food. "Thank you. I'm not one of those people who is happy to use any old thing. That rental place actually has a lot of top quality gear among the crap, which surprised me, I must admit."

Adam headed out of sight to change into his own wetsuit, then returned to put on and check his own gear. Within a short time, they were both ready to dive.

"Take as long as you want, babe, and enjoy yourself," Seth said as Ronda put her mask on, adjusting the straps for the perfect fit and seal. Seth pulled some earbuds out of one of the pockets of his shorts. "I'm going to stretch out on the seat back there and listen to some music."

"We'll be less than an hour," she replied. "One of these tanks doesn't last as long as you might think."

"Okay, well, enjoy," Seth said.

"Thanks, babe." With that, Ronda put the regulator into her mouth and dropped backwards over the side of the boat into the water.

"Fancy a beer while we're down there, mate?" Adam asked with a smile after putting his own mask on. "I got a few in the fridge. You're welcome to them." With that, he put his regulator in and followed Ronda into the water.

Seth considered the idea of a drink for a moment. It was early, but it was a beautiful day, and constantly having Ronda's NPD eating away at the back of his mind was stressful. A beer or two would be great, he decided.

Lying stretched out on the seat at the back of the boat, in the blazing sun, drinking beer and listening to his favourite music had Seth feeling very relaxed by the time Ronda and Adam emerged from the water fifty minutes later. He turned off the music player on his phone and hurried over to help them back on-board. He then assisted with removing her gear. When that was done, Seth stood up and yawned, stretching his arms upwards. "How was it?" he asked his girlfriend.

Ronda removed her fins and gave him a smile that he found stunning. "It was amazing. Thank you so much for sorting all of this out for me. I really do appreciate it. I had a great time down there. I feel great now. There's nothing else that makes me feel so relaxed like this. It's hard to explain."

She planted a kiss on Seth's lips as he wondered what he would actually give for a way to guarantee that she would stay in this frame of mind, if not permanently, then a lot more often. "Don't try and explain," he said. "I'm just glad you're feeling great and you're happy. That's all I wanted."

"I love you," Ronda said quietly and then kissed him again.

While she had been in the water, Seth had thought through how exactly he planned to bring up the subject of therapy at this crucial moment. He considered the plan that he had put together to be quite a good one. "I was thinking while you were down there, we haven't called Maggie since we got here. Let's sit down and get a selfie. We can send it to her and let her know what we're doing."

"Yeah, that'd be nice," Ronda agreed, running her hands through her soaking hair in an attempt at fixing it as they headed to the back of the boat once more. They sat down. Seth put an arm around Ronda and used his free hand to get his phone ready to take their picture. "Remember the first time we took one of these together?" she asked.

Seth did remember their first selfie together, even though it had been three years. It had been taken in an airport. Ronda had uploaded it to Instagram with a caption along the lines of: _I love this guy!_ So much water had gone under the bridge since then, and now here they were, back in a relationship for the second time. "I do remember, and I remember what you captioned it with. I love you, babe."

"Love you too," Ronda smiled. The boat's engine fired up, and they began to move as Seth held the phone out in front of them and smiled as he took the picture. "Aww! That's a great picture," she said when Seth showed her the result. "You have to put that up after you send it to Maggie. Let her get it first."

This was the moment Seth had been waiting all morning for. He could actually feel the nervousness in the pit of his stomach. It was time to bring up the subject of Ronda going to therapy. He wasn't a religious man, but he found himself silently wishing for help from any source that it might possibly come from. All he wanted was for her to go see a therapist and get some help or meds, whatever it took to make sure that the _real_ Ronda was around a lot more of the time. "I'll send it now," he said, as he was doing so. He typed out a brief message telling Maggie that they were having a nice break and that Ronda had just enjoyed a dive. He couldn't type anything about mentioning therapy because Ronda could see the phone's screen. "She loves you, you know?" Seth said gently. "She worries about you, too. We both do."

"You worry about me?" Ronda asked, surprised.

"Yeah, we do. I do."

"This is going to be this NPD thing again, isn't it? You're going to start talking about therapy again." She had sounded disappointed if anything. Certainly not angry, which was a relief to Seth. He hadn't envisioned the conversation developing like this, but he had to run with it now. It was time for his big pitch. He pulled her a little tighter to him.

"Yeah, babe, it is," he said softly. "What I want you to do is think back to when we first got together. Think back to how great things were for the first few months. We were both truly in love with each other."

"We _are_ in love with each other," Ronda said, sounding hurt.

Seth realised that he had made a mistake with his choice of words. "Yeah, of course we are," he said hastily. "You know I didn't mean it that way. What I'm saying is, think back to how great it was. Think back to how happy we were. Think back to how happy _you_ were. You had your neck injury on your mind, but most of the time you were happy. I think that, although that neck injury was terrible, although it must have been so bad to go through that I could never imagine it, I think it helped to keep your NPD under control somehow. That neck injury allowed me to get to know the _real_ Ronda. I fell in love with the _real_ Ronda. Then you managed to move past the psychological thing you had with your neck and you started wrestling, and things started to change. You know they did. You openly admitted it when we got back together last month."

"I know," Ronda mumbled. She had her left arm resting on her legs. Seth saw that her fist had clenched, making the knuckles turn whiter. He didn't know if she was angry at him, angry at the memories, or angry at herself. He decided to continue.

"I want those times back, babe. I want to love every single moment I spend with you. Let's talk about this vacation. Do you realise how much you've complained since we came here? I've spent a fortune on this, and you know how rare it is to get a vacation in this business. We should both be loving it, but you just can't be happy. That's the NPD, babe. It doesn't just make you make other people unhappy or angry, it makes _you_ unhappy."

Ronda was looking down now and she mumbled even more than before. "I'm sorry. I know that you've tried your best to make this vacation awesome. It has been awesome. I'm sorry for complaining so much."

Seth had set his phone aside and now used his free hand to take Ronda's hand and squeeze it. He tried to make his voice seem as tender and loving as he could. "I don't want you to be sorry. I'm not saying this because I want an apology from you. I want you to be happy. I want us both to be happy. If I'm right that you have NPD, it can be treated, babe. You can get therapy. You can get meds. I know it's hard to admit that you might have a problem, but there's no shame in it. You didn't ask for this thing. I've said this before, but if you go to a therapist and you _don't_ have NPD, or anything else - I'm only guessing at NPD - but if you don't have it, they'll tell you that."

"It would mean a lot to you if I did this, wouldn't it?" she asked, squeezing his hand.

Seth closed his eyes for a second at that. A breakthrough seemed to be so close. ""Yes. Yes it would. I promise you, I'll do whatever it takes to support you. If I have to come to sessions with you, I'll be there. I'll talk to Hunter and take time off if I have to. Maggie will be there to help you, too. We love you."

Taking Seth by surprise, Ronda burst into tears. "I'm not a basket case. I'm not fucking crazy. I'm just not."

Seth pulled her even more tightly to him and let go of her hand to turn and lift her chin so that she had to look into his eyes. "No, babe, you're not crazy. But you _do_ need to talk to someone about this. Will you do that for me?"

A long moment dragged by with Ronda staring into Seth's eyes as best she could through her tears. _Please just say yes. Please?_ Seth pleaded silently.

"I need you to help me. I need you to be there for me," she said.

Putting as much conviction into his voice as he could, Seth said, "I promise you, I'll do whatever I have to. I'll find a place, I'll make an appointment, I'll go there with you, I'll even sit in on the session if that's what you or the therapist want to happen."

Ronda closed her eyes. "Okay."

Seth could tell that she meant 'Okay, I'll go to therapy'. He wrapped her up in a tight hug and she awkwardly returned it with the one hand that she could wrap around him. She buried her face in his shoulder and began to cry even heavier. A huge wave of relief had hit Seth, bringing so many other emotions with it. He knew that a lot of people thought he was crazy to be with Ronda and thought that he was even crazier to have broken off his relationship with May Devany, but he had no doubt in his mind that Ronda was the woman he loved. She was the one he wanted to be with now. She was the one he wanted to be with forever. He felt his own eyes dampening as an idea came to him. Was he crazy himself to consider being so impulsive? Was it just the extreme emotions of the moment that were making him consider it? He decided that no, it was what he wanted. But would she want it too? He whispered, "I love you, babe. I'm sorry we both fucked up so bad and wasted two years, but you're the one I love. You're the one I want to spend my life with."

"Me too," Ronda said, her voice muffled into his shoulder.

"Lift your head up. Look at me," Seth said, barely above a whisper.

Ronda did as he asked, wiping the tears from her eyes as best she could. Their eyes met. She studied the love she could see in his eyes for a moment and she just knew what he was thinking. "You're going to ask me to..."

"Marry me," Seth said. "Yes I am. I mean it when I say I'll be there for you no matter what, forever. You'll make me the happiest guy alive if you'll marry me."

Once more Ronda burst into tears. She took no time to consider the proposal. "Yes. Yes I'll marry you." She laughed as he grabbed her into another tight embrace. "I guess you need to buy me an engagement ring."

"I guess I do," Seth beamed, not that his fiancee could see it.

Marrying someone wasn't something that Ronda had ever really thought that she would do. It was all so sudden, but she was certain about her decision to say yes. He was saying that he was willing to stand by her no matter what, and was willing to make the ultimate commitment to prove it. She knew that kind of commitment was going to be needed if she really did have NPD. Seth seemed to be convinced that she did, and he wanted to help her to deal with it. With his love and support, she knew that she could face up to getting therapy. She actually felt a strange sensation almost close to relief now that she had agreed to speak to someone. She pulled away from Seth slightly and laughed. "I don't want to get married in a church, Seth. Come to that, I don't want to get married in a stupid white dress either. You know that crap isn't my scene. Churches aren't your thing either."

"Alright," Seth smiled. "No church. No dress. No stupid traditions. We'll figure out where and how we want to do it so that it's perfect for us."

"That sounds amazing," Ronda whispered, looking into Seth's eyes longingly. "I want to go back to the hotel and spend the rest of the day in the room."

"You'll get no argument from me," Seth whispered back with a grin on his face, wishing that Adam's boat was a lot faster.


	8. Chapter 8

The minor knee injury that Seth had sustained had only entitled him to a week away from WWE TV. He and Ronda had flown out to Hawaii on Tuesday and would be coming home Saturday, which was why Maggie had made the effort to get up early despite it being the weekend. Although he had been back in a relationship with Ronda for a month, Seth had only visited the house that she shared with Maggie once, and then it had only been for one night. That was how busy his schedule had been recently, thanks to WWE's tour of Europe. When she had heard that they would both be coming back home, Maggie had decided to do her best to clean the place and make it look respectable, as well as buying some expensive wine for the three of them to share in the evening as a welcome home gift of sorts.

The purpose of the wine was not solely to welcome Seth and Ronda home though. Maggie had decided that enough was enough; she had to talk to Seth and get him to agree that they needed to try harder to get Ronda to go to therapy for the NPD that they were convinced she had. Even though Ronda was away at least as often as she was home, Maggie had reached the point where she couldn't go on anymore. Ronda's ego had been slowly getting worse and worse since they had moved in together, and because of that, what had once been the dream opportunity to move into a house with someone who had gone from being almost an idol to being a close friend was now becoming unbearable. It would be heart-breaking to have to move out and away from Ronda, but it would be the only option left if something didn't change.

It had taken Maggie the entire morning to tidy and clean the house. Neither she or Ronda were domestic goddesses by any means, which was why the cleaning had been really hard work for her, causing her legs to become very painful. Both women were a lot more focused on things other than chores around the house. Ronda on her work with WWE, Adidas and Oakley, and Maggie on her art. Her fledgling business was beginning to make decent money after a rough start. Getting noticed had proved to be very difficult, but that was where being best friends with someone like Ronda was a big help. She promoted Maggie's work and website on her Instagram on a semi-regular basis, and given that she had over six million followers, it was quite an audience to reach. The biggest success had been when Ronda had posted that any purchase made from Maggie's website during a one month period would automatically enter the customer into a draw to win another picture which she would sign, as well as writing a personal thank you note to the winner. Although Maggie had once been a fangirl who had burst into tears at getting the opportunity to meet the guys from Shield, she had still been astonished at the lengths that some people would go to in order to get their hands on an item which Ronda had signed. Some people had purchased five items, a few had gone even further than that.

Maggie had saved the worst cleaning job for last, which meant that she had barely finished in the bathroom when she heard the front door open downstairs. It then banged closed a moment later. As Maggie headed for the stairs, Ronda called out, "Maggie? You home?"

"Yeah!" Maggie shouted back as she tried to analyse Ronda's tone of voice. She decided that the best word she could come up with to describe it was reluctant. That was bad. Why would Ronda be feeling reluctant about something? The first thing that came to mind was that something might have gone wrong between Ronda and Seth on their vacation. Had they broken up again? That concern was partially allayed when she reached the stairs and started to walk down them. Seth was down in the hallway, setting his case beside Ronda's, up against the wall. He then moved to stand beside Ronda. There was a rather somber expression on his face.

"You guys okay?" Maggie asked. A hint of her nervousness came through in her voice, even though she had tried to keep it hidden.

"We need to talk," Ronda said, looking as serious as she sounded. "Let's go sit down."

By the time she reached the bottom of the stairs, Maggie's mind had come up with another possibility. Was Ronda about to say that Seth was moving in, and that meant that she was going to have to move out? Although she had seriously considered the possibility of moving out because of how Ronda had been acting, it certainly wasn't something that she _wanted_ to do by any means. Certainly she didn't want to be told that she wasn't welcome anymore and had to get out. That really would be heart-breaking. She would have liked to think that Ronda wouldn't do that to her, but the reality was that there was no guarantee of anything that Ronda would or wouldn't do at this point. She owned the house, so technically Maggie could be told to leave at any time.

"Hey, Maggie," Seth greeted her quietly when she reached the bottom on the stairs, sounding very much like a bearer of bad news. There was no offer of a hug from him, which was usually a given.

"Hey. What's wrong with you guys? Didn't you have a nice time?"

Ronda headed for the living room. "Lets just go sit down, okay?"

Feeling a bit like a death row inmate being prepared for execution, Maggie followed Ronda into the living room, with Seth trailing behind. There were two leather couches in the living room, arranged at right angles to each other with a glass topped coffee table rounding off the seating area. The table was usually piled high with clutter, but now the only things on it were a few drinks coasters. If her efforts with the cleaning had been noticed, they certainly hadn't been acknowledged as yet. She sat down on one couch as Ronda and Seth perched themselves on the other. Ronda sat with her right hand over the top of her left, which of course was not something that stood out to Maggie, who asked, "What is it?"

Ronda grimaced slightly, looking to Maggie like she was definitely not looking forward to this conversation, whatever it was about. "Here's the thing, Maggie. Seth and I had a serious talk while we were away, and the conclusion we came to is that things just weren't working out for me the way they are. Something needed to change."

"You're going to tell me to leave?" Maggie asked, feeling tears begin to sting her eyes. She had missed Ronda's use of past tense in her final sentence.

The question was ignored. Ronda continued to talk over the top of it. "We talked it over, and we made a decision." Now Ronda stopped and looked at Seth.

Seth nodded slightly. "Just tell her," he said, sounding like he would rather just have the unpleasantness over with.

Ronda looked back at Maggie. "What we decided is... that we're going to get married."

Silence descended on the room for the second that it took Maggie to process what Ronda had said. A grin started to appear on Seth's face. Maggie let out a shriek of delight followed by a torrent of exclamations. "Oh my God! You're getting married? Holy shit! Wait! You were playing with me, making out something was wrong? You fuckers! You really had me going! God damn it!"

Both Seth and Ronda were laughing now. Ronda leaned forward and held out her left hand to Maggie. On her finger there was a silver ring with diamonds encrusted all around it. The centrepiece was an even larger diamond. Maggie took her hand and gasped as she studied the ring in detail. "Oh wow," she breathed. "It's beautiful. It's amazing. I don't know what to say, you guys. Congratulations. I can't believe it."

"Neither could I when I had to pay for it," Seth quipped. Ronda and Maggie laughed at that as Ronda relaxed back onto the couch. Seth put an arm around her as he said, "We have some other things to tell you, too."

"Don't tell me you're pregnant?" Maggie joked, grinning.

"No," Ronda said quickly. "Hell no. You know kids aren't my thing, let alone having one of my own. Firstly, we want to tell you Seth's going to be moving in with us in the near future. I'm sure that's no surprise at this point."

"Obviously," Maggie nodded. "You're hardly likely to be engaged and not live together. That would be weird. I _can_ stay though, right?"

It didn't escape Maggie that Ronda took hold of Seth's hand at that moment. The gesture seemed to indicate that she felt she needed support with what she was going to say next. "If you want to stay, of course you can. This is your home as much as it is mine. I know you've been finding it tough lately. Finding it hard to live with me, I mean. You've talked to me about this fucking NPD thing several times. Thinking back on it now, I can see how hard that was for you to do. I'm not at all convinced that I have it, but I know that both of you guys are. You've both asked me repeatedly to go and at least talk to someone about it, and I've promised Seth that I will. I'm going to go to therapy. It's not going to be easy though, so I need you guys to be behind me on this thing."

A wave of relief hit Maggie. Finally something had gotten through to Ronda that she might really need to seek help. She was actually going to give it a shot. It was something that had seemed unlikely to ever happen. As far as Maggie was concerned, there was very little doubt that a therapist would come to the same conclusion that she and Seth had done. Giving her friend the support she needed definitely wasn't going to be something that Maggie would shy away from. "You know I'm here for you," she promised. "Never question that. If you need me to come to sessions with you when Seth's on the road, I will do. All you have to do is ask."

"Thank you," Ronda said quietly, looking down and avoiding eye contact.

"I'm going to do some research and find the best place I can," Seth said to Maggie. "I'll be here for the sessions if I need to be, but Ronda's insisting that I don't tell WWE I want time off unless she finds it really tough going. We want to keep this thing between the three of us in this room for now. But, as I won't be around a lot, it's great that you're going to be here for her, so thank you."

"You got it," Maggie said, meaning both the support and the confidentiality.

"Can we talk about something else now, please?" Ronda asked as she took her sunglasses off the top of her head and leaned forward to set them on the coffee table. "Like the fact that you did such a great job of cleaning this place. It was hard to keep a straight face when we walked in. Shit, I barely recognised it!"

"I wanted it to look nice for you both when you showed up," Maggie smiled and then gestured at Seth. "What do you say we assign all the housekeeping to him from now on. I mean, if he wants to move in here..."

Ronda and Seth both laughed. "Not a fucking chance," Seth grinned. "I've seen the state you guys get this place in. I've seen bums living cleaner than the two of you."

"Fuck you," Ronda said, but she had a grin on her face.

"That's no way to talk to your future husband, Mrs Rollins," Maggie laughed, louder than she had intended. The relief at hearing that Ronda was going to at least speak to a professional about her issues was affecting her more than she realised.

"There's just one more thing we need to tell you about," Seth said, prompting Ronda. "We got some more awesome news yesterday, right babe?"

Ronda seemed to relish launching right into the next topic. "I got a call from Hunter yesterday. Although they're going to have Lesnar and I drop the titles this week, they _do_ plan to have me wrestle with the guys. He gave me a speech about how ratings haven't picked up as much as he hoped since they dropped the PG thing. They're trying to think of ways to push the boundaries. I think that's how he put it. Then he started on about how UFC have women headlining their events, and how he thinks WWE are lagging behind in that regard. Then he said, 'Ronda, we're going to have two main events at Battleground, and I want you in one of them.' It's not true though, obviously. There's only one main event on a card, period, and they've gone a bit half-assed by not putting me in it. What Randy and I are doing is headlining, not main eventing."

Maggie had ended up leaning forward, hanging on every word. The word Randy drew another small shriek of delight. "You're going to wrestle Orton? That's insane!" Quickly, she added, "Not insane as in they're wrong to do it, obviously. I mean insane that they _are_ actually doing it. It would be _so_ sick if you were in the main event."

"I suppose they're going to see how I go against Orton. Can't blame them for that, I suppose. Having women wrestling men isn't something they've done much of, and it's been a long time since they did it. Hunter was keen to point out that Orton's looking forward to it, and doesn't have a problem putting me over."

"You're going to _beat_ Orton?" Maggie asked, her eyes widening. She was starting to wonder if the whole conversation was Seth and Ronda still trolling her. Ronda had walked in the house and told her that she was engaged, she was going to therapy, and she was going to headline a pay-per-view whilst beating Randy Orton. Insane was the word she had used a moment before. If it was possible for something to be insane in a good way, then this was it.

Ronda shrugged. "If Chyna can beat Jericho, I sure as shit can beat Orton. He needs time off for filming anyway. You know how many of their crappy movies they keep putting the guy in. Randy needs the time off, and Hunter wanted me to have a new finisher. As you know, they're having Lesnar and I drop the titles already. That's this coming Monday. After that match, Roman's going to end up fighting with Lesnar and Orton's going to come from behind me and RKO the fuck out of me. Then on Smackdown, yeah, Hunter asked me to help him out and work a Smackdown, he's going to get me with and RKO again. On the next Raw, I'm going to get him with an RKO as payback. He'll then come with some statement like, 'if Rousey ever beat me in a match, I'd quit right then and there.' That'll lead to Steph making our match. First person to hit an RKO wins. If I win, I get to use the RKO and Orton's gone. The concept's kind of stupid in my opinion, but I don't do the creative. I tried fighting them on that the first time I was there, I'm not going to do it again. It would make more sense to have me pin him and it would put me over better, but whatever, I'll have to live with it. At least I get to use the RKO, or the RRKO as it's apparently going to be called when I use it."

The fact that Ronda was complaining as she talked about the fact that she was going to beat Randy Orton in a headline match at a pay-per-view was not really a surprise to Seth, which in itself was a sorry statement. If it had been any of the other female wrestlers who had been given this opportunity and this push they would have been over the moon about it, but not Ronda. She obviously viewed it as something that she was entitled to. Why shouldn't she beat Randy Orton? Why shouldn't she main event a pay-per-view? Hunter's decision to push her so hard was unsurprisingly feeding her ego, which was actually the last thing that Seth needed to happen right now.

It also didn't help that Maggie's enthusiasm and excitement were now sky high. She also started to feed the fire. "You're supposed to be a heel, though. Let's be honest, people aren't going to boo you when you're out there beating Orton, whether you cheat to do it or not. I don't see people booing you anyway to be honest. Kayfabe is dead and you're way too popular."

Ronda let out something between a grunt and a laugh as she relaxed back on the couch once more. "I know that. Hunter must know that. I made some comment to him about enjoying being a heel and he decided to run with it. Wanting to be a heel and actually being one are different things though. I must admit, I have gotten some abuse on Twitter since the turn, but not that much. Apparently, Hunter's got something else in mind to try and get more heat on me, though. I'm going to be told about it in person Monday. I've been invited to sit in on a creative meeting. Aren't I the lucky one?"

Having heard more than enough, especially with the final piece of sarcasm, Seth decided to use the opportunity created by Ronda having to cough to change the subject away from wrestling. She helped him out by moving forward a little as he wrapped an arm around her back and then pulled her closer to him, ending up with a hand on her stomach. "I was thinking that we could go out for something to eat tonight to celebrate our engagement, all three of us, I mean."

The distraction worked perfectly. Ronda took the hand that Seth had just wrapped around her in one of her own as she gave a quiet but contented sigh. She then rested her head on his shoulder as she said, "That would be nice. It'll be almost like having a family."

Maggie smiled. "I'm not related to you guys, but we definitely are family. I'm so pleased for you both, really I am. I _can_ be maid of honor, right?" She saw Ronda glance at Seth as she asked the question, looking like she was seeking conformation of some kind from him. Seth gave a slight reassuring smile.

"We're not having all of the ceremony and religious crap at our wedding," Ronda calmly announced. "Seth and I are making a commitment to each other, not to some kind of God. Whenever and wherever we get married, it won't be with a church full of people in dresses and suits and all that bullshit. It'll be something private and low key, but of course we want you there with us. Like you just said, we're family now. You guys are the only family I need. You're the only family I want."

"That's really sweet," Maggie said, seeming a little embarrassed. "You know, I bought a bottle of wine, thinking that we'd share it tonight as a celebration. Why don't we just open it now? It feels like the right moment to me."

Ronda removed Seth's hand from her waist and stood as she said, "I could go for a glass of wine. Let me help you with that."

Seth quipped, "I'll have some wine, but I'll put my feet up and let the ladies do the work in the kitchen. It's your territory after all."

Maggie had also stood up now. She tilted her head slightly as she looked at Seth, as if wondering if all his dogs were barking. "You do know I'm not going to try and stop her kicking your ass for that, right?"

All three laughed as Maggie and Ronda walked out of the room. Seth was glad that things were working out at home, his new home, but there was still Ronda's therapy to think about, as well as the fact that she seemed dead set against the idea of having her mother or sisters at their wedding, or involved in her life at all. Hearing her be so dismissive of her family had given him the urge to get back in contact with his own parents. It had been weeks since they had even exchanged a phone call. All in good time, he decided. Getting Ronda's therapy started was the most important thing to focus on for now. Mending fences with his mom and dad and heading over to see them with Ronda could wait until she was on a bit more of a level footing. That would definitely be for the best.

"One step at a time," he muttered to himself.


	9. Chapter 9

Attending a creative meeting was about to be a first for Ronda as she walked through the backstage area, having just arrived at the arena early on Monday afternoon as instructed. As far as she was concerned, WWE couldn't possibly criticise her attitude or her work ethic. They had asked her to work a Smackdown taping the next day and she had agreed, despite not being contractually obliged to do so. They had then asked her to arrive at the arena earlier than was usually required for a Raw event so that she could sit in on the meeting, and again she had agreed, despite the inconvenience. "Talk about going above and beyond," she mumbled to herself. "You'd better remember this, Hunter, that's all I can say." The hallways were busy, but only with crew members. Ronda paid no attention to them as she walked by them. It was too early for anyone she recognised to be around, or so she thought.

"Ronda! Wait up!" a familiar voice called out from behind her.

Turning around, Ronda saw Sarita Lopez walking towards her. Sarita was a long way from being Ronda's favourite person in WWE, but at the Royal Rumble the two of them had shaken hands and agreed to put their past animosity, which had at times been very public, behind them. Since then, they had at least been cordial with each other. A smile and a hello in a hallway was about the limit of it, but that was a lot better than how things could have been when Ronda returned to WWE.

"What are you doing here?" Ronda asked. It was as close to a greeting as Sarita was going to get, although her tone of voice was more surprised than unpleasant.

"I was going to ask you the same thing," Sarita said as she reached Ronda and they started walking along the hallway side by side. "I'm here for a creative meeting. Hunter asked me to come in."

"You're in the same meeting as me," Ronda said, failing not to sound a little offended by the fact. "I'm supposed to be finding out how he plans to get more heat on me. This is his genius idea? Have me wrestle you? I know you're a face, but I'm not going to get real heat by kicking your ass."

Determined to be the bigger person, Sarita let Ronda's arrogance slide. The satisfaction of knowing something that Ronda didn't definitely helped in that regard. "No, that's not it. Hunter told me I'm getting a heel turn and I'm being put on a team."

They turned a corner into another hallway as Ronda took in the news. "They're making us a team? I don't understand. I mean, I'll give you credit, you played a good heel in that first run we had against each other, but why would we team up?"

"I guess we're about to find out," Sarita said quietly as Stephanie McMahon walked out of an office up ahead of them and walked in their direction.

"Hello Ronda, Sarita," Stephanie smiled pleasantly and gestured down the hallway in the direction that the two women had just walked from. "Turn back around, we're in the room you just walked past. I realised I left my cell phone in our office."

Ronda and Sarita greeted Stephanie in turn and then followed her as she pushed open the door and walked into what turned out to be a small conference room. There were three seats along either side of the wooden table and one at each end. The chairs themselves didn't look particularly comfortable to Ronda. She also had no idea who the nerdy looking guy with short brown hair and glasses was who was sitting in the first seat on one side of the table. Presumably he was part of the creative team. He certainly looked the type. The boss, Hunter Helmsley, sat at the furthest end from the door and smiled as they entered.

"Good afternoon," he said as Stephanie took the closest empty seat to her husband.

Ronda had acted quickly upon entering the room and followed Stephanie, leaving Sarita to go sit next to the nerd. However, Ronda realised that it would potentially be beneficial to be nice to the guy if indeed he was from the creative department. For that reason, after greeting Hunter, Ronda offered her hand to the man and smiled. "Ronda Rousey."

"Tom Evans," the man smiled back, not looking anything like as awed as Ronda had hoped he would. He then also shook hands with Sarita, who introduced herself.

"Tom's going to be the head writer on this one, and he's going to take notes on this conversation," Hunter announced and then said, "Have a seat, and we'll get to it."

Sarita sat down next to Tom. As Ronda sat herself, Stephanie asked, "Did you have a nice few days in Hawaii, Ronda? I saw you post a few pictures."

It was the kind of opportunity that Ronda couldn't resist. It was an easy way to get everyone's attention on her. "It was great. Actually, we got engaged." She raised her left hand and showed her ring to Stephanie.

"Oh!" Stephanie exclaimed, beaming as she looked at the ring. "Congratulations! Wow, it's really beautiful."

The room became fully focused on Ronda for the next several minutes as everyone enthusiastically passed on their congratulations, commented on the ring, and asked how the proposal had been delivered. Ronda savoured the attention on both her and her ring, but didn't go into detail on the final point, saying only that it had been a moment that she wouldn't forget, but she and Seth wanted it to remain private.

"Alright, let's get into it," Hunter said eventually, after taking a sip from his glass of water and setting it back down on the table. There was an identical glass in front of everyone else, along with a notepad and a pen. Tom was the only one who had shown any interest in using them so far. He began to write his first note as Hunter got the discussion started. "Ronda, you know why you're here. We're trying to get this heel turn to take. So far, it's not happening to the extent that we want it too. You don't have enough heat. We've looked into what our options are as far as that's concerned, and we think that what we need to do is play on this alliance between you and Steph a lot more. She's got the most heat right now, arguably out of anyone on the roster, let alone the women. So, what we're going to do is form a stable. Initially it will be you Steph, you Ronda, and you Sarita."

Glancing at Sarita, Ronda thought that she looked pleased by the idea. As far as she was concerned, that was no surprise. Working with her was a huge opportunity for Sarita. It would mean that she was instantly elevated to the next level. The question was, was what in it for Ronda? Given that she was already booked to wrestle Randy Orton, where was the advantage in then joining a stable with two other women? She decided to keep her mouth shut and listen for now because Stephanie was already speaking and it seemed that a similar thing had occurred to her.

"You already know what I think about the basic concept from when you told me about it the other day. A dominant heel stable composed entirely of women is a really good idea. We've somehow ended up with a lot of faces in the Divas division and no real heels. But, the first thing that comes to my mind now is that Ronda's going up against Randy. She's wrestling a guy and then joining a stable with two other women?"

"That's right," Hunter said, clearly prepared for the question. "Ronda's going over Randy. We already knew that, but what we hadn't decided was how exactly that was going to happen. Now we have. Sarita, you're going to come out and get on the apron, distracting Randy. When he turns round, Ronda gets the RKO and the cheap win. That's how this thing starts."

"I'm not sure about this," Sarita said, shaking her head. "I can't believe that a lot of the fans won't be cheering for Ronda in that match, whether she's supposed to be a heel or not. People like her and she's a woman taking it to a guy, giving him as good as she gets. They're going to love it. I'm a face, so me coming down and helping her to win? I don't know, just doesn't sound like it'll get booed to me. Definitely not by the majority, anyway."

"We'll sell it with the commentary," Tom pointed out, looking up from his notes, which seemed to be pretty much a written account of the conversation from what Ronda could make out as she glanced at his pad. She enjoyed the fact that Sarita acknowledged her popularity. Sarita was right that it was incredibly hard to get people to boo her. That was the way it should be, too. People recognised a world class athlete when they saw one, regardless of what part they were playing within a storyline.

Hunter scratched the side of his nose as he thought for a second. "Maybe they'll cheer it, maybe they won't. Rome wasn't built in a day. We're going to end that segment with Steph coming out and the three of you celebrating in front of the stage. The next night on Raw will be when this thing really gets going and starts to generate heat, when Steph cuts a promo backstage and announces that she's formed a team. Picture the scene. Steph, you're counting off names on your fingers. Ric Flair? Gone. Batista? Gone. Then you emphasise even more. _Randy Orton_? Gone. Then you give us that evil grin into the camera and even more emphasis. _Triple H_? Gone."

"Wait a minute," Ronda cut in, recognising the significance of those four particular names. It was a surprise to her, but she felt a rush as she realised that she had likely figured out where this was heading. WWE had actually managed to come up with an idea that impressed her, an idea that _excited_ her. "Evolution? Oh shit! You're going to make us a female version of Evolution?"

With a grin, Hunter confirmed, "That's exactly what I'm going to do. In a way, it's going to be Steph continuing to taunt Triple H. She's going to form herself a team, call it Evolution, have the same entrance music, same style of video, you guys are going to dress smartly in suits or dresses, the whole deal. It's going to deliberately be a shameless rip off of the original Evolution, and that's one reason that people will hate it. Thoughts?" The question was directed openly to everyone at the table.

"I really like it," Stephanie beamed. "A truly dominant heel stable in the Divas division is a fantastic idea as I said before, and I think you're right, this could draw serious heat if we write it well enough moving forward. It also keeps the Steph/Triple H rivalry alive without you being on screen. I say yes, we definitely go forward with this."

"Sarita?" Hunter asked next.

"I like it too. You asked me the other day if I was up for a heel turn and I meant it when I said yes. I enjoy playing a heel. The only thing that comes to mind is the past, uh, issues between Ronda and I. That got very public at one point, so we can't really pretend it didn't happen. Everyone in this room knows we put it behind us, but the fans don't know that. How do we explain that? Or how do we _use_ that?"

"Hmmm," Hunter said thoughtfully, rubbing at his beard with his left hand. Ronda continued to remain silent and observe the conversation for now, knowing that her time to speak would come. She already had several points to discuss when it did.

Tom spoke next, sounding a little unsure about his own words. "Depends how far Ronda's prepared to go with this. That's how it seems to me, anyway."

Ronda narrowed her eyes slightly and ordered, "Explain."

Seeming reluctant, Tom said, "You're trying to play a heel on screen while not playing one off it. You're out there on Raw expecting people to boo you, but the next day you're at the airport taking pictures with fans, you're responding to people on Twitter, sharing fan art that people send you on Instagram, all that stuff. No one hates you because you make it close to impossible for them to do so."

"He does have a point," Hunter said, before Ronda could reply herself. He didn't intend to embarrass Ronda in front of everyone in the meeting by mentioning the fact that the reality of trying to deal with her ego and attitude was a long way removed from the image that she presented to the public. He knew that Ronda would know what he was thinking, whether he said it aloud or not. "You have a great public image. There's definitely nothing wrong with that, but, now that Tom's said it, it seems obvious that it's a large part of why you can't draw heat."

"Makes sense," Stephanie agreed as she picked up her glass of water.

She proceeded to down half of it as Ronda realised that all eyes were now on her, waiting for a response. This writer, this _nobody_ , had seen fit to question the way that she went about her business, and everyone else seemed to agree with him. What did these people expect her to do? Did they really think that she was going to throw all of the hard work that she had put into building up her fan base in the trash just to make a heel turn on their wrestling show? Her initial reaction had been that no, there was no way that was going to happen, but within seconds another thought occurred to her. Maintaining her public image sure was a lot of work and often went against what she really wanted to do. Did she want to fuck around in an airport for half an hour taking pictures with spotty faced teenagers who reeked of body odour? Hell no. She would rather walk past and completely ignore them. Did she mean half of the things she said when she wrote back to fans on Twitter and thanked them for their support or kind words? Hell no. She did it purely because it made people think that she was awesome and went above and beyond compared to almost every other celebrity. There was definitely an argument that it would not only be a burden lifted if she stopped doing those things, it would also feel kind of badass to walk through a bunch of fans and completely ignore them. When all was said and done, that was the kind of thing that someone of her stature really should be able to do.

Looking at Ronda, Hunter could see that she was considering what had been said. Suddenly, he saw in front of him an opportunity to not only generate the required heat for his storyline, but also a way calm some of the Ronda Rousey hype that was once again gaining it's own momentum and becoming a problem. It was one thing to have someone on the roster who drew money and ratings to the extent that she did, but there were certainly a lot of negatives that came along with her. He decided to push while the going looked to be good. "Remember when we signed your contract, Ronda? Remember what you said to me about enjoying playing a heel? You said to me something like 'can you write something that will get people to boo me?' The answer's yes, we can make you a team that people hate. We can make you a team that people _despise_ , but you need to do your part, too. That goes for you as well, Sarita. What I'm saying is that you'll need to play your on screen characters off screen too, in public I mean, obviously. It's definitely not an easy thing to do, I know that, but it really can pay off with some amazing heat in the long term."

Almost without leaving a pause, Sarita spoke enthusiastically. "I'll do it. I'm definitely up for it. The only thing I've got to say is that it means you backing us, Hunter, Steph. If some fan gets in my face because I don't sign their shirt or something and I tell them to fuck off, I don't want to be dragged in here to get the riot act for it. If we're going to do this, then we need to go all-in. It's not something that will work if we go about it half assed."

Stephanie glanced at Hunter, looking uneasy. "Swearing at fans? This is sounding like it's going a bit far now. Even though we got rid of the PG era, we can't have that kind of thing."

"She's not saying she's going to swear at people all the time," Ronda said, failing to keep her irritation towards Stephanie out of her voice. "She's saying that you guys can't tell us to do something and then not go all-in with it to back us. She's exactly right, too. If I'm staying in character and I'm playing the kind of role you're talking about, I'm going to have to tell someone to fuck off at some point if they're in my face. And if I do? You won't be dragging me in here and yelling at me, that's a certain fact."

Hunter's reaction took Ronda completely by surprise. She hadn't heard him use such a harsh tone with anyone off screen before. "That's the last time you open your mouth like that to my wife, or anyone else in one of my meetings, you hear me?"

Along with the surprise she felt, something about the body language she saw at the end of the table told Ronda that she would come out of an angry exchange wishing that she hadn't gone in. "Yes," she mumbled, using the fact that she reached for her glass of water as an excuse to break eye contact with the boss.

A tense silence hung in the air for a half second before Hunter spoke again, moving the meeting on. "There will be _no_ swearing at fans. You can act angry, you can even throw in a mild insult from time to time if you must, but _no_ swearing, and absolutely _no_ putting your hands on anyone. Is that clear to both of you?"

"Yeah, that's fair enough," Sarita agreed easily.

"Okay," Ronda said, feeling hurt and embarrassed by the way she had been chastised, now concentrating on fiddling with her pen.

"Any other questions on what we've discussed so far, before we move on?" Hunter asked as he made a note for himself, this one mental rather than written. He had watched Ronda carefully since warning her about the way she spoke, and he had paid attention to the way that she had reacted to a firm tone being taken with her. Rather than coming back with even more attitude, she had pulled her head in and sat there almost like one of his own daughters after being told off for back chatting their mother. That was interesting to say the least. Maybe Ronda was so used to everyone pandering to her because she was Ronda Rousey that what she really needed was someone who was prepared to be consistently firm with her, someone who would take none of her attitude and none of her drama. If that was what was required, then that would be what happened. There was not going to be a repeat of Ronda's first run with the company, that was for sure.

"I have questions," Ronda said, finally re-establishing eye contact, but keeping her tone respectful. "We form this Evolution team, which is a great idea, but then what? What's in it for Ronda? My character, I mean. Why do I need to lead this team? Wait, I am going to be the leader, right?"

There was a slight glance between Hunter and Stephanie. It was only slight, but Ronda couldn't help feeling that maybe she was supposed to have picked up on it anyway. Hunter's tone grew a little firmer again. "No one's going to be the _leader_. This isn't about an ego trip for you, Ronda, or anyone else. This is about having a group of four badass heel women on the show, getting the kind of heat that we haven't seen women get for a long time, aside from Steph. But, don't worry, you're going to get a push out of this. More specifically, at Summerslam, you're going to become the second ever female Intercontinental Champion."

Ronda looked down at the table as a strange, unpleasant feeling washed over her. She wasn't entirely sure herself what the feeling was exactly. Emptiness. Maybe that was it? Or maybe it was sadness? The glance between Hunter and Stephanie replayed itself in her mind, as did the harsh words he had said to her. The look in his eyes was intended to tell his wife, 'I got this.' Ronda realised that, to him, she was nothing more than a problem to be managed. That knowledge really hurt her. She looked down at her black painted finger nails and her engagement ring that she was so proud of. Seth's voice came into her mind, along with Maggie's. They were joined by her mother's voice, then by those of her sisters. Everyone was saying variations of the same thing. They wanted her to get help because they were convinced that she had a problem of some kind. NPD. That was what Seth and Maggie kept talking about. A disorder that made a person incredibly self-centred to the point of being impossible to deal with; to the point of being impossible to manage; to the point of being impossible to love; to the point of being impossible to be around at all. Now Ronda's imagination conjured up an image of Hunter sitting in a very similar meeting at a very similar table with a bunch of guys from his creative team. Hunter was laughing as he said, "Don't worry about Rousey, we can put the IC belt on her. That'll keep her happy for a while." It was an easy way to manage a problem.

"Ronda?" Stephanie asked softly, placing a hand on the shoulder of the woman beside her. To Stephanie, it looked like the emotion of the prospect of being given such an honour had proved to be too much. It was surprising, coming from Ronda of all people, but that was how it seemed.

"I need to go," Ronda mumbled, shrugging Stephanie's hand away, standing up and quickly heading for the door. It was obvious to everyone in the room, even from behind, that she was crying by the time she rushed out of the door.

Both Stephanie and Hunter had stood up at the same time. Hunter was going to call out to Ronda, but he could tell that she was not going to stop or come back. Sarita and Tom looked very awkward, which was no great surprise. "You go," Stephanie said. "I can carry on here with Sarita and Tom."

Hunter wasted no more time in heading after Ronda. He was lost as to what she was crying about. He had mentally compared her to one of his children a few moments before, but even they wouldn't have reacted that badly to a few stern words from him. In any event, it seemed to have been the mention of the Intercontinental Championship which had actually upset her, for whatever reason. As he left the room and let the door swing closed behind him, Hunter saw through the glass pane in the door of the identical conference room opposite that Ronda had rushed in there and was sitting at the table with her head in her hands, obviously crying heavily. Letting out a sigh, he walked over and opened the door. Sure enough, the sound of Ronda crying was his only greeting. He decided to be as gentle as he could. "Ronda? Why are you crying?"

No response came, so Hunter walked over, pulled the chair beside Ronda's out from under the table and sat down. Her face remained buried in her hands. Hunter tried again. "Ronda? You need to tell me why you're crying. What's wrong?"

"You. You think I'm just a problem," Ronda said through her tears. Her voice was also muffled by her hands.

Hunter hadn't been able to make out what she said. "I can't hear you. Can you stop crying and talk to me? Whatever the problem is, we can sort it. Okay?"

As she tried to compose herself, Ronda said, "You can't sort it. No one can sort it."

This time Hunter was able to hear her. "No one can sort what? I don't know what you're crying about. Why are you upset?"

Ronda took her hands away from her face and ran them through her hair, taking a deep breath as she did so. When she spoke, she sounded more frustrated than upset. "You just think I'm a fucking problem. You're just like everyone else. You only want to give me this title run because you think it'll make me easier to manage. I'm not just some problem to be managed. That's how my family used to look at me. That's how Seth's starting to look at me." She stood up and began to pace around the room, sounding even more frustrated. "I'm not just a problem! I don't have be constantly managed. I don't need a fucking sitter to watch me! I don't need to be given the Intercontinental title when I've not earned it, just to fucking keep me happy!"

Hunter held up a hand to stop her as she paced in his direction. He continued to keep his voice calm, even though he wasn't sure what she was ranting about. "Sit down, Ronda. Calm down and we'll talk about it." He gestured to her chair to encourage her. She hesitated for a moment as if debating with herself whether she should do as he asked, but then she sat down, this time facing him.

"I'm the only one who can sort it," Ronda muttered vaguely.

"Alright, forget wrestling and rewind for a second because you've lost me. You're talking about your family and about Seth thinking you're a problem. What makes you say that?" The question caused Ronda to wipe at her eyes again. She looked very much like she was fighting back more tears. "Just tell me," Hunter urged. "I can't help you if you don't tell me what the problem is."

"Everyone thinks I have something wrong with me," Ronda blurted out. "Seth and Maggie keep talking about some fucking thing called NPD all the time. They talked me into going to therapy for it, as soon as Seth can find somewhere for me to go. They've both done their best to be there for me, but I can't deal with this shit. I come here and you're treating me like I'm a problem that you need to manage. I saw the way you looked at Stephanie in there. I _saw_ you. I'm not going to sit there and have you think that I'm just a problem, and congratulating yourself for being able to manage that problem. Treat me like a fucking person!" Her voice had raised significantly with the last sentence.

"Calm down," Hunter said once more. "Take a breath." He waited for a moment to give Ronda some time, then he continued. "You want me to be honest? You are a problem. You've been a problem pretty much since day one the first time I signed you, and you're becoming one again. Whether it's this NPD thing or not, you're very hard to manage. Not only that, you alienate the people you work with. I'm not going to sugar coat it just because you're upset right now. What I will do, though, is help you. If you do have NPD, or any other health issue, we'll support you in exactly the same way that we would do with anyone else on the roster. I'm no expert on mental health issues by any means, but I do know what NPD is, and I know I can get you details for a good therapist who can help you. We'll do as much as we can to get you the help you need, but that doesn't mean that you have free reign to show up to Raw each week with any kind of attitude you please. If you don't want to be looked at as a problem, then you need to stop _being_ a problem."

Ronda was looking down at her hands now and playing with her engagement ring, rotating it around her finger. "I already agreed to go to therapy," she mumbled. "I'm trying, damn it. I'm trying my best to make this work with Seth. It _is_ working. We love each other. We're going to get married. I want things to work here, too. I enjoy wrestling so much. I think this idea of the female Evolution team is really great and I want to be part of it. If we do it right, we could be the best heels out there. That's what I want to be a part of."

"And you will," Hunter said, giving her what he hoped was a reassuring smile. "Although you think otherwise, I didn't want you on this team as a way to manage you or anything like that. I wanted you on the team because you're one of the best female wrestlers we have. That's why I re-signed you. In that ring, there's no other woman like you. Your problem is that you know that as well as everyone else does and it goes to your head. You walk around back here like you're better than everyone else. _That's_ the problem I have to deal with when it comes to managing you. Look at how you spoke to Steph in there a few minutes ago. There's no excuse for taking that kind of tone, or for being disrespectful like that to people, especially not me or Steph. You just can't do that."

"Those things just happen though," Ronda sighed, looking up and making eye contact again at last. "I don't sit there thinking that I don't respect Steph, or you, or the company. I just, hell, I don't know. I don't get along with people. My own family have nothing to do with me anymore."

Looking back into her damp looking eyes, Hunter thought that it didn't take a therapist to work out that Ronda was a very troubled woman. What would take a therapist was helping her to turn the aspects of her life that she wasn't happy with around. He felt himself struggling for what to say next. He knew nothing about her family and didn't feel like it was his place to offer advice, as far as they were concerned. He realised that Ronda had guessed what he was thinking when she said, "Just leave me, Hunter. Give me a minute to sort myself out and I'll come back in."

Hunter knew that she was talking about re-joining the creative meeting on the other side of the hallway. "Are you sure? We can do this another time if need be."

"No," Ronda said quietly as she resumed rotating her engagement ring around her finger. "I'll be okay. Just give me a minute. I'll go wash up in the bathroom and I'll come back in."

Hunter stood up and gently squeezed her shoulder. "I'll get a number for a therapist to you. When I go back in, I'll say that you've got some private stuff going on and that nothing is to be mentioned about what happened in there to anyone else. Okay?"

"Thank you," Ronda said. She watched him leave and then closed her eyes tightly, telling herself that although she had lied about it to everyone else, she knew the truth as far as her family was concerned. They were not the reason that she hadn't spoken to or seen any of them for more than three years, she was. Her mom in particular had always said that she was welcome to call if she needed to talk, or welcome to come home if she needed to. Maybe it was time to do just that? If the reality was that everyone back home had been right all along about her needing help for a real psychological problem then there was no need to be angry with them anymore. There had been no need to cut them all out of her life for such a long period of time.

She opened her eyes and looked down at her engagement ring again. It's presence on her finger told her that life didn't have to be all about loneliness and misery. With help from Seth, from a counselor and maybe even from her family, it really could be possible for her to live a normal life, to be happily married and to have a successful career with WWE. "I have NPD," she told herself aloud, finally accepting the likely fact, even without an official diagnosis. "I have it, but it will _not_ beat me. I've never let anything beat me before. I'm certainly not going to fucking start now."


	10. Chapter 10

Five minutes after Hunter returned to the creative meeting, Ronda also walked back into the room. The cold water she had used to wash her face in the bathroom had helped her to calm down. She now felt ready to continue the discussion, but returning to the room also made her feel embarrassed, given that she had left it in tears. Crying was a fairly regular thing for Ronda, which she knew was a fact that would surprise a lot of people, however she would always do her best to avoid crying in front of other people. Showing weakness like that wasn't how she had been raised. Showing weakness of _any_ kind wasn't how she had been raised.

"Are you okay, Ronda?" Stephanie asked with a pleasant smile.

Ronda knew that Hunter would not have told Stephanie what they had discussed minutes before because he would not have had the opportunity to do so with Sarita and Tom in the room. There was no doubt that the two bosses would discuss it later, but for now Ronda decided to try and go on with the meeting without bringing up what she had been upset about at all. First off, there was an apology to make. "Yeah. I'm okay. I want to apologise for being rude to you before."

If the apology surprised Stephanie, she certainly didn't show it. She merely gave a nod of acknowledgement as Ronda sat down beside her once more. "Forget it," she said easily. Without missing a beat, she got the meeting back underway. "I was just talking with Sarita about the fact that she's going to go on a losing streak until Summerslam. It'll give the fans and the commentators something to speculate about in terms of a possible motive for her joining Evolution, once it's happened."

"Alright, that makes sense," Ronda said. She picked up her glass of water as she asked, "Hunter, earlier, you mentioned four people being on this team?"

"I was just going to ask about that," Sarita joined in, sounding keen to learn who the fourth member would be, as Ronda downed her entire glass of water.

Hunter smiled as he took in the eager expressions on both Sarita and Ronda's faces. He imagined that Ronda was probably hoping that it would be her friend Nikki Bella, whereas Sarita was possibly hoping that it might be Natalya, who she had teamed with successfully in the past. Both women were going to be disappointed because he had other ideas. "As Steph mentioned earlier, we've managed to end up with a lot of faces in the Divas division. We're already going to be working on turning you, Ronda, and you, Sarita. Attempting three heel turns at once might have been a bit much to ask, which is why I've decided to add someone who's already playing a heel to the team. Devon Dawson, to be specific."

"Oh," Sarita said quietly, a smile breaking out on her face as she considered the announcement. Working with one of the brightest prospects from NXT was something that definitely appealed to her. "I think that's a good idea. Devon's really got something going on. She's a little raw, but she has talent. There's no doubt about that."

Seeing everyone now looking in her direction for a comment, Ronda knew that she was in a difficult spot. She knew the name Devon Dawson and would recognise her if she bumped into her in a hallway, but that was about as far as her knowledge went. She couldn't remember how long it had been since she had watched an episode of NXT or paid any attention to what went on there. Saying so would hardly be diplomatic, even she realised that. "I think it's a good idea too," she smiled, hoping that it looked convincing enough.

It didn't. That became apparent with Hunter's reply. "You don't know who Devon is do you, Ronda?"

"Sure I do. She's the African-American girl in NXT. Short, but muscular. Uh..."

Sarita laughed heartily at Ronda's obvious awkwardness as she ran out of words. "Give it up, girl. You don't watch NXT, do you?"

"Fine," Ronda huffed, glaring at Sarita. She was not at all happy with being laughed at in front of the bosses. "I don't watch NXT. Let's all have a good fucking laugh shall we?"

"Enough," Hunter said firmly, grimacing at Ronda's latest show of temper. "Calm down, will you? There's no need to go off the deep end like that. Sarita's right with her description of Devon. She's a little raw, but she has a lot of talent that we can definitely capitalise on if she develops and gets over. That's where I want the two of you to come in. Sarita, you've been with us for four years including your time in NXT. You've never taken on the role of mentoring someone before, but I want you to do so now. You have experience that you can pass on to Devon which will only help her to improve."

"You got it," Sarita said, sounding pleased with what she had been asked to do.

"What about me?" Ronda asked a little testily as she absently picked up her already empty glass once more. She then looked at it as if it had offended her by being empty and set it back down on the table. "I'm willing to take time out to train with her too."

Hunter caught the sideways glance from his wife. This topic had already been the subject of much conversation in the days prior to the meeting. Having Devon work with Ronda was an obvious double-edged sword if ever there was one. The area of Devon's work in the ring which needed the most improvement was her technique, her mat wrestling, which happened to be one of Ronda's strengths, along with her powerful physique. Devon had impressive strength for a woman who stood at only five feet three inches, and she also had quickness. If Ronda could mentor her and improve her mat wrestling, Devon could become a very impressive performer indeed. Unfortunately, the obvious problem with having someone work with Ronda was that she could be a nightmare outside of the ring, both to manage and to work with.

Thanks to his one on one discussion with Ronda a few minutes earlier, Hunter now knew that potentially this could be put down Ronda having NPD, which was a condition that he had heard about in the past. While that knowledge made him feel like he was willing to help her, he still didn't want conflict between her and Dawson, or even worse, for Ronda's bad attitude and ego to start to rub off on the younger woman. It had been a tough decision, but he had decided that, to start with at least, Ronda would also mentor Devon with the objective of improving her technique. Ronda was looking at him expectantly, obviously wanting to join Sarita in mentoring the up and coming star. It wasn't clear whether that was because she actually wanted to do so, or because she didn't want to appear inferior to Sarita in some way.

"Yes, Ronda, you're going to be involved too. What I want you to do is work with Devon on her technique. Mat wrestling is her weakest area..."

"I guess I can help with that," Ronda cut in, sounding less enthusiastic than she had seemed a moment before. No one else in the room paid much attention to Hunter's unfortunate phrasing, given that a turn of phrase was all that it was, but it had included a trigger word for Ronda. Weakness was definitely not something that was acceptable to her. What right did someone who was weak have to be on the same team as her? What right did someone who was weak have to be on Raw at all? Weak people should be made to stay in NXT where they belonged, or they should be released, period. When this Devon character showed up for training she would quickly learn that weakness wasn't going to fly, that was for sure. "If anyone..."

Hunter made no attempt to hide his irritation as he quickly cut back in himself. "I'm speaking." He noticed that Ronda looked chastised by the firmness of his voice, as she had done previously. Part of him wondered if she was going to start crying again, but she didn't, thankfully. That would have been borderline ridiculous. Instead, she kept her mouth shut and listened as he continued with explaining what was going to be required from her in regard to mentoring Devon. It was then announced that Dawson would be backstage at Raw for several weeks prior to her introduction to the Raw roster and to Evolution. This was the first of those weeks, meaning that Ronda would get to meet her for the first time later in the day.

Following that discussion, Tom took over and ran through some of the details of the early stages of the Evolution storyline. When that was complete, so was the meeting. Hunter thanked Tom, Sarita and Ronda for coming in and then dismissed them. Stephanie waited until the door closed behind Tom, who was last to file out of the room, before speaking to her husband. "You were a lot firmer with Ronda today. I would have said that was a good thing if she hadn't rushed out of here in tears. That seemed a bit over the top on her part."

Hunter massaged his face with his left hand. As usual, dealing with Ronda had been much harder work than it should have been. "When I followed her out, she admitted to me that Rollins thinks she has NPD. They're looking to set her up with a therapist. I told her I could help with that and I'd get her a number for someone. I need to make a call to the office on that."

There was no response from Stephanie for a moment as she thought about the revelation. "Narcissism," she said eventually, as if saying the word aloud helped with the thought process. "That would explain a lot, wouldn't it? Hey, at least she's acknowledged it and she's willing to see someone. Once she's gotten help for it, it should start to get easier to work with her."

"I don't think easy is a word I'm ever going to associate with Ronda. What I did learn today though, was that she responds to me being firm with her. That means I'm not going to take any more crap from her, NPD or not. She needs to get the idea in her head that she works for us, just the same as everyone else in the locker room." With that, Hunter pushed his chair back and stood.

Stephanie grinned as she followed suit. "I love it when you take charge."

"I know," Hunter smirked back, looking forward to doing exactly that when they got back to the hotel after Raw. When they walked out of the room, they were surprised to see Ronda and Sarita still standing nearby, having an animated discussion. "Everything okay, ladies?" Hunter asked as he walked towards them.

Ronda turned to face him and didn't miss a beat before passionately launching into her answer to his question. "Not really. I don't like the idea of me having the Intercontinental title. I'm not trying to kick off or make a scene here. I'll have the title if you insist on it, but my question is, why? Why have me win one of the men's titles? Why not focus on making a better division for the women instead? If you want me to have a title and have me and it be the focal point of Evolution, great, but make it the Divas title. Actually, _fuck_ the Divas title. We're not Divas, we're women. Make a Women's Championship and have me win that instead. Make a women's tag team division with titles. Bring back the Women's Money in the Bank. Why the hell you only did that once, I'll never know. It was a great idea. You want women to main event your shows? Great. It's awesome that you're finally willing to do that, but let's do it _right_. Let's have women wrestling women, in well written women's storylines, for women's titles."

No one said anything for a moment. Ronda looked at the faces in front of her. There was surprise on Hunter's and intrigue on Stephanie's, particularly in her eyes. She liked the ideas that had put forward, that much was obvious. Hunter glanced at Stephanie and she raised her eyebrows a little. "We have talked about bringing back a Divas, or Women's, Tag Team Championship in the past," she pointed out.

"All of us would love it if that stuff could happen," Sarita said, unable to help the fact that part of her admired the way Ronda went about her business at times. She imagined that it must be nice to be in a position where you felt like you could say whatever the hell you wanted and get away with it.

Hunter said, "Your comments will be considered, Ronda, and I'll get back to you with a decision. Fair enough?"

"Fair enough," Ronda nodded as a smile appeared on her face. "Thank you."

With that, Hunter and Stephanie walked off along the hallway. Ronda watched them go with the smile still on her face.

* * *

Roman Reigns smiled as he held the fingers of Ronda's left hand while studying the engagement ring that she was proudly showing to him. It was beautiful. What the ring, and what it symbolised, should have made Roman feel was happiness, but it didn't. What it actually made him feel was relief. The fact that Ronda and Seth were now engaged had partially lifted a weight from his shoulders. It was a weight that could never be completely lifted. This was as good as it would get in that regard. At least now that Ronda was engaged to Seth, she had a more compelling reason than her friendship with Roman to keep her mouth shut about what had happened between them.

It wasn't that he thought Ronda would deliberately set out to tell someone about what had happened, and therefore ruin his marriage. No, Ronda was a friend, a real friend. The problem was that she could be very unpredictable, especially when she was unhappy. That was largely the reason that it had happened in the first place. He had feared when Ronda re-signed with WWE that all it would take was for her to have a bad night backstage and then go get drunk as a result, and her mouth might loosen up a little too much, causing her to say the wrong thing to the wrong person. Actually, saying anything to anyone about what had happened would be disaster enough.

The saying was that if two people knew something it wasn't a secret. Two people definitely knew that not long after Seth and Ronda had broken off their first relationship, Roman and Ronda had slept with each other. It had only been once, but that would be no defense as far as Roman's wife was concerned. She had always been very clear that there was a zero tolerance policy in their relationship as far as cheating was concerned. It had been something that he had totally agreed with, until that night with Ronda. The truth of it was that if he hadn't been married when Ronda first joined WWE as a referee, and if Seth hadn't made his own move on her so quickly, Roman would definitely have made a move on her himself. Instead they had become close friends, until that night in the hotel when they had become even more.

Ronda had been miserable backstage at a Smackdown taping, with everything being made worse by seeing Seth with May Devany, and Roman had found her crying, although she had tried to hide the fact from him. Wanting to be there for her, he had invited her join him in his room that night for a drink and a chance to unload on someone. He realised later that he should have seen the potential right then and there that he might end the night doing some very different unloading of his own, and so it had proved to be.

It wasn't even as if he had drunk enough to make him unable to recall the events of the previous night when he had woken up with Ronda in his bed beside him. No, he had remembered it very clearly. Ronda had always insisted that she would never say anything, but Roman had never been able to rely on that with any kind of certainty. She was much too temperamental and unpredictable for that. Even now, with Ronda engaged to Seth, there was no absolute certainty of her mouth staying shut, but it was at least a lot closer to certain. If she spilled the beans now, she had almost as much to lose as he did, for there was no doubt about how Seth would react to the news, whether Ronda has been single at the time or not. You just didn't sleep with your best friends girl, let alone within a couple of weeks of them breaking up. Almost. That was the key word. She had _almost_ as much to lose. She didn't have a daughter to consider.

When Ronda had left WWE, Roman hadn't doubted the fact that she would return some day. That had put him in a minority of one at that point, but he had been proven right. It had taken more than two years, which was much longer than he had actually expected, but he had been right nonetheless. He had also known exactly what Seth was like. He was never happy with a woman, never happy in a relationship. Cheating was certainly not an uncommon thing among the guys in WWE. Too many lonely nights away from home saw to that. Even so, Seth was something else. The only time that Roman had ever seen his friend truly happy in a relationship had been during the first few months with Ronda, until either her ego or his jealousy of her popularity, probably both, had soured things.

Often, reading Seth wasn't a difficult thing for Roman to do, and it had quickly become obvious that he wasn't committed to, or even particularly interested in, May Devany. It would have hardly taken a mind reader to figure that out. In fact, it seemed to border on the ridiculous that May hadn't seen it for herself. Roman knew of one occasion where Seth had cheated on May for sure, and he would have been willing to make a bet on there being others too. The truth of it was that May had been treated the worst by everyone involved, but Roman could live with that without losing any sleep over it. In any event, she seemed to be moving on quickly enough with Dolph Ziggler.

Throughout all of this, Seth had continued to pine after Ronda. He would even talk about her when May was around. It was a little pathetic in Roman's opinion, given that all Seth had to do the first time was put more effort into the relationship and try to figure out how to get her vastly expanding ego under control.

To Roman, what all this had meant was that it would be for the best for everyone involved, including himself, if Seth kicked May to the curb and pursued Ronda once more. He had remained friends with Ronda during her absence from WWE and chatted to her on a semi regular basis, largely because it helped to put his own mind at ease that she wasn't going to go running her mouth about their night together. It also gave him the opportunity to openly tell Seth multiple times that she missed him and regretted how things had ended, just as much as Seth did himself.

Sure enough, when Ronda had shown up at the Royal Rumble, the spark had been there between her and Seth immediately. Seth hadn't wasted much time in breaking up with May, and here was Ronda wearing an engagement ring. It seemed that the two of them were willing to actually commit fully to each other this time. Roman was happy for them both about that, but nothing like as happy as he was for himself.

It was a little strange that Ronda had come to him alone to break the news of the engagement. She had explained it away by saying that she and Seth had agreed that she would get to tell him and Seth would get to tell Dean, which was presumably where he was right now. The fact that he was alone with Ronda in the privacy of his locker room gave Roman the opportunity he needed to reiterate how important it was for her to keep her mouth shut about their night together. The question was, how to actually go about it? "It's beautiful," he said with a smile, referring to the ring.

"It really is," Ronda beamed back. "I'm still not used to wearing it, honestly. Jewelry isn't really my thing."

Roman decided to let his tone of voice do the job for him rather than actually saying anything specific as he let go of Ronda's hand. "You'll both be really happy together."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Ronda demanded quietly but aggressively as her expression hardened.

"Nothing," Roman shrugged. "I meant exactly what I said. You guys will be real happy together. I'm really happy for both of you, you know that. I just wouldn't want to see it get ruined by you saying something about... you know."

"Why are you bringing that up?" Ronda hissed at him, instinctively glancing towards the door, which of course remained closed.

"Just to remind you to keep quiet about it, that's all," Roman said just as quietly, making sure that he didn't sound threatening. After all, this _was_ a reminder, not a threat.

"I know that. I'm not a fucking idiot," Ronda hissed once more, getting even more worked up. "Why would I want to run my mouth about that and wreck your marriage and my own? Tell me that?"

"Easy, easy. Calm down," Roman urged, placing a hand on Ronda's arm. "I said what I had to say. We're both on the same page, so let's drop it. Okay?"

Ronda glared at him for another couple of seconds before her expression softened a little. She sighed, then said, "Alright, let's drop it. But don't ever mention it like this again. I don't need to be told what to say and what not to say like some kind of stupid kid."

"Okay, message received." Roman said. "Shall we go try and find where those two have gotten to? Maybe we can get something to eat as well?"

"Sounds like a plan," Ronda said, following him towards the door.


	11. Chapter 11

When Ronda and Roman walked into catering, they saw Seth eating alone at a table. Ronda glanced around the room and saw that Ric Flair was also in there, sitting at another table, chatting with Randy Orton over meals of their own. Although she would not have used the term herself, Ric had taken on the role of mentor to Ronda since the Royal Rumble, at the encouragement of Hunter. She was eager to talk to Ric about what had been discussed in the creative meeting earlier in the day, so she decided to go over and see if Seth was okay, then head over to join Ric at his table.

Seth looked up and saw them approaching his table. "Hey," he greeted them warmly. "Sorry, I was too hungry to wait for you."

"Congratulations, bro," Roman said, referring to the engagement which he had been told about minutes earlier. He smiled as he offered a handshake to Seth.

"Thanks, man," Seth grinned as he accepted the handshake. He looked at Ronda and added a joke as Roman sat down opposite him. "I'm committed to this now. I must be fucking mad."

"Rather you than me," Roman laughed, despite knowing deep down that to some extent it was a lie.

Standing beside both of them at the end of the table, Ronda also played along. "Standing right here, guys. I know I have cauliflower ears, but they still works."

Both men chuckled, then Roman said, "Where's Dean? Ronda said you'd gone to tell him about the engagement."

"I did tell him," Seth said, diverting his attention back to the not very impressive looking, half eaten lasagna on his plate. "He's gone out to practice in the ring with his new best buddy."

"Ziggler? Really?" Roman asked, making the idea sound a little distasteful.

"Yep," Seth shrugged. "They've got a real hard-on for each other lately, for some reason." He shoveled a fork full of food into his mouth.

Ronda made a derisory grunting sound. "No wonder his hair's thinning so quickly, with Renee's thumb on his head all the fucking time."

Again, both men chuckled. "Just don't get any ideas of getting like that with me," Seth quipped to her.

"Me? Start acting like that boring, goody two-shoes little shrew? Not likely." Ronda then sarcastically impersonated Renee's voice, " _Stop swearing. Let's not go out for a drink with the guys. Let's stay in the hotel room instead_. _Let me bore you to sleep in front of the TV._ "

"That's harsh," Roman said, laughing along with Seth even so. None of them considered that there might be another rather obvious reason that Renee didn't wish to spend time with the three of them any more than was absolutely necessary.

Ronda looked over at Ric and saw that he was still chatting away with Randy, although they had both now finished eating. She turned back to Seth. "I'm going to go have a chat with Ric for a bit."

"Okay," Seth said as she leaned down and kissed him on the cheek.

Roman stood up and announced that he was going to get something to eat as Ronda headed over towards Ric and Randy's table. As she approached, she saw that Randy was just making to leave. The timing was perfect, not that Ronda had been afraid to insert herself into the conversation if it had been ongoing.

"Ronda," Randy greeted her pleasantly as he stood and saw her approaching.

"Hey, Randy."

Ronda had expected that to be the full extent of the conversation, but as he walked towards her, Randy said, "We need to get together at some point to talk over our match. I mentioned it to Sarita earlier and she suggested that maybe we could get dinner somewhere with you and Seth next week after Raw? You're going to be working together a lot with the Evolution thing, so she figured it might be an idea if you got to know each other better."

It took effort from Ronda for her not to show a reaction to Randy's mention of Sarita. There had been rumours going around that they had been dating for a few weeks, but to her knowledge, no one had known for sure, until now. It was also a bit of a surprise that Sarita was making an effort to get to know her. Ronda considered that Sarita's attitude had definitely changed since they had shaken hands and agreed to put the past animosity behind them, as well it should have. Thinking about Seth talking to her about the NPD thing and Ric talking to her about improving her attitude to her colleagues, she decided to smile and accept the offer. "I'd like that. I'm sure Seth will too. It sounds like a good idea."

"Alright," Randy said. "I'll book us a table somewhere and let you know."

Ronda nodded and Randy walked away, leaving her to approach Ric's table and sit down opposite him. Given his unofficial role as mentor to Ronda, Ric had already been given a heads up from Hunter on the creative plans for her and the new Evolution team that she was going to be a part of, as well as the fact that she would be asked to mentor Devon Dawson, although he wouldn't let on that he already knew any of those things when she told him about them.

To begin with, he had been unsure about being asked to discreetly work with Ronda, but as the two had gotten to know each other better he had genuinely come to like her. He guessed that out of everyone who worked for WWE, he was the only person, aside from Ronda's few friends and Seth, to have seen the other side of her. The fact that she both respected him and liked him seemed to bring that other side out of her when they talked in private. There had been times that she had come to him when she was pissed off or frustrated about things and he had been able to talk her down and chill her out. It was sometimes like dealing with an awkward child, but there had been other times when they had cried together both from laughter and sadness. It definitely seemed to Ric like Ronda looked to him as a father figure of sorts. He knew that she had lost her dad when she was young and he guessed that was a logical reason for her to subconsciously want someone to take on that kind of role for her, especially given that she was now estranged from the rest of her family.

A lot of people would not have had the patience for what Ric was doing, but in addition to liking Ronda, he had actually seen the beginnings of progress with her. Since he had taken her under his wing, she hadn't created any drama over creative plans and hadn't shown up late for any of the shows that she had worked. For most people, these things were a given, but not for Ronda, judging by her first run with the company. What Ric had been trying to figure out was whether she had serious attitude problems or a genuine psychological condition of some kind which made her act the way that she did. Little did he know, he was about to get the answer to that question from her directly, along with some other news.

"Hey. How are you?" Ronda said as she sat down and pulled the cheap plastic chair up to the table. She had a pleasant smile on her face, which already set Ric apart from most people that she spoke to, and she made sure to keep her left hand in her lap, hiding her engagement ring from him.

"I'm doing great," Ric smiled back. He shoved his empty plate to the side, out of the way. "Not getting anything to eat?"

"You know me. I don't like to eat before the show."

"How was Hawaii?"

It was exactly the question that Ronda had hoped for. "It was great. Seth really tried his best to make it special for us, for me. One day, he chartered us a boat and rented me some scuba gear so that I could dive. It'd been a while since I got the chance to do that. It was a shame that he couldn't join me, but he had to rest his knee. You remember we talked once before about how much I love diving?"

Ric nodded, smiling, encouraging her to go on. Hearing how happy she sounded was nice for him.

"So, I did the dive and I really enjoyed it. I always feel so chilled out after a dive, so relaxed. I got out of the water and then pretty much right off the bat Seth got me to sit with him at the back of the boat. Then he started talking to me about something we'd talked about a few times before. I want to tell you about it, but I need to know that you're not going to talk to anyone else about it."

"Of course I won't," Ric said. He wasn't sure what was coming next, but he was glad that she had chosen to confide something in him. "Whatever you tell me will stay between the two of us, you know that."

"Alright, uh..." Ronda faltered and looked down at the table. Without thinking about it, she put her left hand on the table and absently started to rotate her engagement ring around her finger.

Ric immediately noticed what was obviously an engagement ring on her finger, but made no mention of it as he tried to encourage her to go on. "We can go sit in your locker room or something if that would be easier?"

"No." Ronda said, looking up at him, suddenly with renewed determination in her voice. "I'm okay. I need to deal with this. I need to talk about it. Seth thinks I have something called NPD. Maggie agrees with him. They think this thing, if I have it, makes me the way I am sometimes. They think I can speak to a therapist and get treatment for it, and that if I do, I can stop feeling stressed or unhappy or angry so often. It makes Seth miserable when I'm like that and it makes Maggie miserable when I'm like it too. Seth talked to me about all of that on the boat and I felt so bad about it, about how I make them feel. I started crying but he told me that he loves me and he wants to be there for me and help me through this, as does Maggie. They're my family now, Ric."

As he watched Ronda talk, Ric had seen her eyes filling with tears. Despite that, he smiled. What he was hearing was good news, especially with the ring on her finger added to the equation. The fact that she had agreed to speak to a professional was also great news. "Don't cry," he said softly. "You've done a brave thing by agreeing to speak to someone about this. And you're going to have your husband to support you. Well, fiancee anyway."

Ronda stared at him for a second. "What? How did you..." Then she noticed that her hand was now on the table top. "Oh, I spoiled the surprise. Yeah, Seth asked me to marry him. That happened on the boat too, right when he was telling me that he will help me with this thing because he loves me and wants it to work for us this time."

"Let me see the ring then," Ric said, knowing that he could probably prevent her from crying by talking about the ring first and then returning to the subject of her possible NPD. Ronda held out her hand and he took it. "Look at this thing," he said as he studied the ring. "What did the guy do, rob a bank while you were over there? It looks amazing. Seriously, congratulations, to both of you."

"Thank you," Ronda said. She took her hand back at used it to wipe her eyes. "I just hope he doesn't leave me again because of this fucking thing."

Ric knew that she meant the NPD. "He said he'll support you and then asked you to marry him. He's going to support you. Maggie's going to support you too, I'm sure. _I_ am going to support you, if you need me to, and so will Hunter if you tell him about this."

"I already told him," Ronda revealed, looking down at the table again and mumbling as she continued. "I had to leave the creative meeting because I started crying. He thinks I'm just a problem to manage. I don't want to be just a problem. I want to be like you, Ric. I want to be one of the best at this. I know I can do it, if I can just get my fucking head into it. Sometimes I sit there in the locker room or at home or whatever and I think 'This is it. No more bullshit. No more drama. Focus on wrestling. You can be the best if you focus,' but then it doesn't happen. Something just, happens, and I just, I don't know. Hunter said he'd get me a number for someone, so there's that at least."

"I'm no expert, I must admit, but I'm glad you told Hunter," Ric said. "I'm sure that whoever he recommends you to will be able to help you if you stick with them. Actually, forget if, you _will_ be sticking with them. I'm not going to have you quitting on this thing. You've done the hardest part by asking for help, and I'm very proud of you for that."

Ronda felt her eyes stinging with tears again because of how much Ric's carefully chosen words meant to her. "You're really proud of me?"

Ric nodded seriously. "I am. Asking for help shows strength, not weakness. You have the strength to deal with this, just like you had the strength to deal with a broken neck. You have the strength, girl. And you know what else you have? You have the talent. You have the talent to be one of the best female wrestlers in the history of the business, _if_ you can focus and apply that talent. We've talked about that many times. Seth will help you with the therapy. I'll help you with the wrestling. How does that sound?"

They both knew that it wouldn't be anything like as simple as his words made it sound, but in the broadest terms it sounded perfect to Ronda. "That sounds like exactly what I need. I feel fucking stupid having this thing, but from now on I'm going to look at it the same way I looked at my neck injury and everything else in my life. I'm going fight the fucking thing and I'm going to kick the shit out of it."

It was hardly a speech worthy of Martin Luther King, but the determination with which she said the final sentence gave Ric a lot of confidence in her. He grinned broadly. "There's the Ronda I know."

After a few minutes, the conversation moved on to the subject of the upcoming Evolution storyline. Ric enjoyed the eagerness that Ronda displayed so clearly while talking about it as she ran him through all of the plans that had been discussed in the earlier meeting. "Hunter also asked me to mentor Devon," she announced as her final point.

"Really?" Ric asked, failing to completely hide his surprise at that decision. To him, mentoring someone wasn't something that Ronda needed to be taking on when she had serious issues of her own to take care of. "How do you feel about that?"

Ronda considered that for a moment. "Honestly? I'm not sure. Hunter said that Devon's weak at mat wrestling."

As he heard that, Ric's eyes narrowed. "I doubt that's exactly what he said. Nothing about Devon is weak, I can tell you that for a fact. She's very good in the ring, if a little raw. Mat wrestling might be her weakest area. Is that what Hunter actually said?"

"Uh, yeah, it might have been," Ronda said thoughtfully, massaging the back of her neck as she tried to remember what exactly had been said. The word weak was all that had really stuck in her head.

"Look, Ronda, I know you. I know how you think sometimes. Yeah, it might be this NPD thing, but that doesn't give you a free pass to treat people however you want. You'd gotten the idea into your head that Devon was weak, and you were going to approach her as such, weren't you?"

Knowing that there was no point in lying to Ric as it wouldn't work, Ronda simply mumbled, "Yeah."

"That's _not_ going to happen," Ric said firmly, leaving no room for argument. "There are two ways we can go forward from here and neither of them involve you bullying that girl when she's trying to make the huge step up to the main roster. Are we perfectly clear on that?"

"I wasn't going to..."

"Yes you _were_ going to bully her," Ric cut in, not letting her off the hook. "Don't try and give me that. As I said, we can go one of two ways here. Either you tell Hunter that you're not going to mentor Devon because of the other stuff that you've got to deal with, or you do mentor her, but you do it _properly_. You take that girl under your wing and you help her improve on her weaker areas as well and maximising her strengths. You've taught people judo before, so I know that you know how to coach people if you put your mind to it. You have no idea how satisfying it'll be if you get your head into this and invest your time in her and she goes on to win the Divas title one day, which she will. There's such a feeling of pride that you get with something like that, watching someone you're close to winning something special, much like the feeling I'll get when you win the Intercontinental title."

"You know about that?" Ronda asked, surprised.

"Yeah. Hunter told me about it. Actually, he asked my opinion on it. I told him I thought you would make a great Intercontinental champion. I know it's been done once before with Chyna, but having you win a men's title would still be something really special. You do realise how much of an honor it is for you, right?"

Ronda leaned forward and rested her head in her raised hands. She then growled in frustration at herself. "I told Hunter I didn't want it. I told him I wanted to be the Divas Champion instead, and then I said fuck the Diva's title, make a Women's title again."

Ric shook his head in both disbelief and frustration, not that Ronda could see him through her hands. Even to him, she was unbelievable sometimes. This was exactly the kind of thing that he was trying to work with her on, exactly the kind of thing that she needed to stop doing. "Hunter says he's going to put the IC title on you and you tell him you don't want it? Are you for real sometimes? There are countless men in this company who would give so much for that chance. Any of the women would hardly believe he was even for real, but you? You say _no_? Why would you possibly do that?"

The only response from Ronda was that she rubbed at her forehead with her fingers in frustration, still hiding her face in her hands.

"I asked a question," Ric said. Once more, he wasn't going to let her off the hook by allowing her to ignore him. She needed to realise and acknowledge that she had been wrong to do what she had done. There was definitely no doubt about it, sometimes dealing with Ronda could very much like dealing with a child, and it was no less frustrating.

"Because they'll go and give it to Sarita or Devon," Ronda mumbled into her hands, obviously meaning the Diva's title. "Then I'll have to stand in the ring with them, on the same team as them, while they're holding a belt that says they're the best woman in WWE. They're not. I am."

Sighing, Ric said, "Look at me. Stop sitting there like that. You're not a kid." Ronda reluctantly did as he said and he asked, "What have we just been talking about? NPD and trying to deal with it. And how many times have we been over how it's important to respect the other women and to respect Hunter? With this bullshit, you've done the exact opposite of those things."

"I know, alright?" Ronda said irritably. "I fucking know. I don't mean to do stupid shit like that. You know that. Of course I want the IC title. Hunter didn't make a decision on it anyway. Hopefully he'll stick with the original plan. Anyway, you think I'm not listening to you? You think I'm not trying to improve? You think I don't want to do the things we've talked about? I'll show you. I'll show you right now. I'm going to go find Devon."

Without waiting for a response of any kind, Ronda shoved her chair back angrily, stood and marched away. "Good luck," Ric said quietly as a grin appeared on his face.

Thanks to asking crew members for directions, it only took Ronda a couple of minutes to find Devon Dawson's locker room. In the process she had also learned that Devon was sharing with May Devany, of all people. "Just keep fucking pushing me," Ronda had mumbled to whatever kind of god might have been laughing at her as she walked away from the crew member who had provided her with the less than welcome news. Ric's encouragement to be pleasant and respectful to her colleagues, even if she didn't like them, was what she tried to keep in mind as she approached and then knocked on the correct locker room door. "If I can do this I can do fucking anything," she mumbled.

Sure enough, it was May who opened the door a moment later. As usual, May was as close to pleasant as their personal differences allowed. She even managed a smile. "Hey, Ronda. You're here to see Devon, right? We got the news on the mentoring from Hunter just now. I'll leave you to it."

"Thank you," Ronda said, feeling very awkward but glad that she had not responded by being rude to May. It actually was possible. Ronda moved aside to allow May out of the room and then entered herself. It was the first time that she had met Devon, but she had seen the attractive African-American woman a few times in the past, enough to know who she was at least. Ronda smiled. "Devon. I'm Ronda Rousey."

Devon had just stood up from the bench that she had been sitting on. Even so, she was considerably shorter than Ronda, standing at only five feet three inches. She wore a black leather moto jacket, grey denim skinny jeans, gray snake-skin cami blouse, black peep toe ankle booties, a silver necklace and chandelier-style earrings. She also wore a smile that looked about as unconvincing as Ronda's. "Ronda. From what I hear, you're not afraid to talk straight with people. We have that in common, so here it is. Hunter wants me to work with you on my mat wrestling. I know he wants that for all the right reasons, and I do respect what you can do in the ring and what you've done in the past in judo, so I've agreed to it. I'll tell you this though, I might be new on the main roster, but I've heard enough about you. You know exactly what I mean, and I'm _not_ going to stand for it. I'm no pushover. I'll work with you, you'll teach me, hell, maybe I'll even teach you a thing or too as well, but either way there will be _no_ bullshit. Can we agree on that?"

The introduction was just about the last thing that Ronda had expected. Surprisingly even to herself, she found herself smiling as she held her hand out for Devon to shake. "Finally. Someone aside from me who has some fucking guts around here. Yeah, we can agree on that. I'll train you. I'll work you into the fucking ground, but in a good way. I'll teach you how to kick ass like you wouldn't believe, if you stick with it. Can we agree on that?"

Devon stared intensely into Ronda's eyes as she accepted the handshake, gripping Ronda's hand as hard as she could. Both women could sense that this was a turning point in their careers, but in which direction?


	12. Chapter 12

When Ronda had agreed to mentor Devon on Monday afternoon, she certainly hadn't envisioned that by Wednesday night she would find herself in a locker room at Full Sail University in Winter Park, Florida. Hunter's pitch for her to not only be at the NXT TakeOver event, but also to take part in it, had come from left field as far as she was concerned. The way he had pitched the idea was that firstly, and most importantly, it would be a way for her to see Devon Dawson in action up close and in person. Given that she never watched NXT, she had never seen her new protege wrestle a match before, which was a lot less than ideal, for obvious reasons. The second advantage was to use the opportunity to begin to build towards the upcoming Evolution story line. Lastly, a totally unexpected and unannounced appearance by Ronda Rousey would send the fans wild.

From Ronda's point of view, being asked to appear at such a small venue and on what to her was such an insignificant show first seemed to be a bit of an insult. Her first instinct had been to pretend that she had a prior commitment with Adidas that she wouldn't be able to get out of, but a small part of her realised that doing so would be a victory for her NPD. That was what was making her think that she was too good to waste her time appearing on NXT. It was a fight now and the NPD could not be allowed any kind of victory, however small it might be. There was another part of her that simply wanted to enjoy wrestling, which was something that Seth had also said to her on more than one occasion. His voice had repeated itself in her head, "You don't need to do this for money any more, babe. You don't have to work the crazy schedules or the house shows. Just do it because you like doing it." She had realised that he was right. Appearing on NXT could be fun, and in any event, there was no doubt that she would be the centre of attention. For those reasons, she had agreed to Hunter's request. Now that she was there, though, she was in a good mood and looking forward to the show.

A firm knock came on her locker room door, surprising her a little and making her look up from the text message that she was in the process of writing to Seth. The knock was quickly followed by a loud but friendly male voice. "Ronda? Okay to come in?"

Ronda had already changed into jeans, a dark blue T-shirt with her trademark RR logo on the front in red, which was the latest design in the range, and a black leather jacket. She was ready to open the show when the time came. "Yeah, Hunter, you can come in," she called out. She stood to greet the boss as the door opened and he walked in.

"All set for the opening segment?" he asked pleasantly as he closed the door and walked over to her.

"Yep," Ronda said simply.

"That's good," Hunter smiled. "Listen, I just wanted to stop by and ask if you used either of those numbers that I got for you? For the therapists."

After Raw on Monday night, Hunter had given Ronda a number for a male psychological therapist and a different number for female one, so that she could choose whichever she felt she might be more comfortable with. He had said that both were very highly regarded in their field. After discussing it with Seth that night in their hotel room, Ronda had decided that she wanted to try seeing the woman, Jenna Wilson, first and see how it went. Seth had then said that he would make the call the next day to book her an appointment. Ronda had thought that she didn't have to be a genius or a mind reader to figure out that there was a part of Seth that didn't fully trust her to do it for herself. In that, he was wrong, but she could understand why he would think that way. Now that she had faced up to the high likelihood that she had NPD, all she wanted to do was beat it, which meant getting treatment for it. She was already aware that NPD was a condition which was possible to treat, but not to cure.

"Yeah, Seth called and made me an appointment with Jenna, uh, whatever her name was," Ronda said. "He wanted to come with me to the first one, so we're doing it a week from today. He's got no house show to work that night, so it was the best day for us to choose."

"Okay," Hunter nodded. "I've never met Jenna before myself, but the guys back at the office spoke very highly of her when I asked the question, obviously, or I wouldn't have given you her number. I really hope you get along with her and she can help you. If you need Seth to go with you to any further appointments, let me know and we'll see what we can figure out with his schedule."

"You don't have to do that," Ronda said, feeling surprised and genuinely appreciative of the offer.

Hunter shrugged slightly. "No, I don't _have_ to do that. I told you before that we look after our employees, Ronda, and I meant it. Sit down for a minute." He gestured to the bench behind her. Ronda sat down as he had asked as he picked up a steel chair which had been left standing up against the wall in the corner of the room. He opened the chair and sat down in front of her. "You know how many people thought it was a good idea when I decided to sign you back here?"

To Ronda, this scene brought back memories. Way back when, in a not dissimilar locker room to this one, Vince McMahon had once sat down and had a long talk with her about what was and was not considered acceptable as far as WWE employees were concerned. It had been a serious attempt to help her, she knew that now. If she had paid attention to it, a lot of things might have worked out differently. As for right now, there was only one possible answer to the question. "No?"

"Nobody," Hunter said, matter of fact. "Everyone wanted to tell me that it wasn't a good idea, wanted to tell me how badly it worked out last time, and tell me that, quite frankly, Ronda Rousey wasn't worth the amount of drama that was sure to come along with her."

"Okay," Ronda said quietly, hesitantly, unsure of where this was going.

"You know what stopped me from listening to them and made me sign you up anyway?" He didn't wait for a reply. "Sheer fucking belligerence, to be honest. For reasons that we both know about, you ended up leaving WWE. I considered that to be a failure not only on your part, but also on mine. I pushed you onto the main roster too quickly and I wasn't firm enough in the way I managed you when you started to go off the rails. I know that we can _both_ do better than we did last time, and we will, especially now that you're seeking treatment for this NPD thing."

Ronda was about to speak, but Hunter said, "Let me finish. I said I'd get back to you about the points you raised Monday night regarding the IC title and the Divas division. We've discussed everything you brought up. Some of those points will be revisited at a later date, but the information I have for you right now is that the original plan is still in place creatively, meaning that you will win the IC title at Summerslam. I know you wanted to..."

This time Ronda did cut in. Since she did it politely, Hunter let her continue. "Can I just say something?" she said. "I got to thinking after I spoke to you about the IC title and I know I went a bit far with what I said. I want to thank you for deciding to put the belt on me. Having it will really be an honor for me. I just, I don't know, I say and do shit without thinking things through sometimes. I'm sorry, okay? It frustrates me as much as it does you. Give the Divas title to whoever you want. It's your creative. I know that. I'm excited by this Evolution thing and I can't wait to get started on it."

Pleasantly surprised by the apology and by how sincere it sounded, Hunter smiled. "Okay. Well, hopefully Jenna will be able to work on that with you. We're all excited by the Evolution story line. Actually, I needed to speak to you about that as well. Do you have any commitments next Friday?"

"I don't think so. I'll have to check with Willow to make sure. Why?"

"We've got to film the entrance video for Evolution," Hunter announced, still smiling. "I'm sure you're familiar with the style of the video that the original Evolution had. We're going to do something very similar with yours. So, what's going to happen is, you're all going to come out and meet up with Steph at home, where you'll have makeup done and you'll change into expensive dresses and the rest of it. There will be some sports cars waiting for you there too, which we'll have hired for the day. We'll shoot a bunch of footage with you all looking glamorous and with you driving the cars. You'll also go to a club that night and we'll get more footage of you there. Devon's going to be there as well, so that we have shots of her to add into the second version of the video when she joins the team."

Ronda's eyes had lit up while she listened to that. "I'll make sure Willow clears anything I might have on," she said enthusiastically. "That sounds like it will be really great. I can't wait."

The conversation ended with a run through of what exactly was required of Ronda during the night's event, which she listened to and readily agreed with, without any questions. Hunter wore a satisfied smile as he walked back to the production office. The combination of Ronda's determination to improve her attitude, which was partially due to Ric's mentoring, and his own decision to take some personal involvement in managing her, meant that there were real signs of progress from her. His decision to act against everyone else's advice and re-sign her certainly now looked like it was going to pay off big time with her soon-to-be Intercontinental Championship run while she was also a key part of a women's stable the likes of which had never been seen in WWE before.

There was, of course, another reason that Hunter had signed Ronda back, but it wasn't one that he was going to mention to her. That reason was the strange phenomenon that the staff in the creative department referred to as Ronda Rousey ratings. For whatever reason, people were drawn to watch her segments and matches in vast numbers and that was before she got the Intercontinental title and before the Evolution story line got started. The fact was that there was serious money to be made by having Ronda on the roster, but at the same time he had to be responsible as an employer and make allowance for her NPD, which meant using caution when it came to pushing the Ronda hype machine into overdrive, which was definitely what he would have done with anyone else in her position. Shameless shilling was a strategy that WWE were certainly not afraid to use, which was why there was a sheet of paper in his in-tray back at the office which contained a whole list of ideas of ways to market Ronda and ram her down everyone's throats to the fullest extent. All he had to do was give the green light, but he couldn't. Not yet.

Shortly after Hunter's departure, Ronda also left her locker room. The last thing she had to do before the show started was head to Devon's locker room to meet with her and her opponent in the main event of the night, Naomi, who was working part time on NXT due to the fact that she was struggling to make an impact of any significance on the main roster. The specifics of the ending of the match needed to be worked out, and Ronda had an idea of exactly how she wanted it to be done.

* * *

Unbeknownst to Ronda, there were in fact three women in Devon's locker room, as May Devany had just walked in there. May was friends with both Devon and Naomi, much as she was with nearly all of the other women on the roster, and she had decided to come down to Florida on her night off to enjoy being backstage during the show. "Hey, guys." May smiled warmly as she walked in and closed the door. "What's going on?"

The two other women were already dressed in their ring gear. May sat down on a bench beside Devon as Naomi said, "Just waiting on the Queen." Most of the women in WWE had taken to using the sarcastic nickname that Renee had originally thought up for Ronda.

"Rousey's here?" May asked, raising her eyebrows in surprise.

"Yep," Naomi said. "The Queen is mixing with us commoners tonight. Aren't we the lucky ones? She's refereeing our match, and taking the spotlight off it, obviously."

"They should have called it NXT TakeOver: Ronda Rousey," Devon quipped. "They've got me and her opening the show, too. I've got to go interrupt her and call her out on being more interested in Hollywood than wrestling, and being nothing more than a glorified referee with a stupid wristband gimmick when all's said and done. Oh, the irony."

Naomi and May laughed. "No wonder they say kayfabe's dead," May said.

Devon continued. "I already told her Monday night, although we're going to go ahead with this mentoring thing, I'm not going to stand for any of her bullshit. I told her straight. She might be able to teach me judo or whatever, but she's not going to act like she's better than I am. Fuck that."

Knowing how feisty Devon could be, neither woman doubted what she said. "How did she take that?" Naomi asked.

"Well, actually, she said it was about time there was someone else with some guts around here."

Naomi grunted sarcastically. "Guts? If she thinks having a bad attitude and mouthing off at people means you have guts, then yeah, she's the gutsiest of us all."

"Just watch what you say to her," May advised. "If she kicks off with one of you, it'll be you it comes back on, one way or another. It's not worth it. We all know she's Hunter's golden girl, for some reason."

"Maybe he's fucking her?" Devon said, pretending like she had just discovered the meaning of life itself.

All three women laughed. Only a few seconds later a knock came on the door. Devon shouted, "Come in!"

The door opened and Ronda walked in, failing to hide her surprise when she saw May. "Hey," was all she managed, addressing the room as a whole.

May stood up as Devon and Naomi returned Ronda's greeting in kind. "Hey, Ronda. I'll leave you to it."

Something totally unexpected happened in Ronda's head as May walked towards her, heading for the door. Some part of her felt bad that May felt the need to leave the room purely because she had walked in. Not only was that a reason to feel bad, it also made Ronda look bad in front of Devon and Naomi. "You don't have to do that," she said. "Sit back down. If you want to, I mean."

Surprised at what appeared to be something vaguely approaching an olive branch, May paused for a second. She had no reason or desire to be friends with Ronda, but at the same time, she knew that it was inevitable that they would have to work together now that Ronda was back with WWE on a three year contract. It would be better for everyone concerned if that could be done without hostility. For that reason alone, she nodded and went back to sit beside Devon.

No one had been outwardly confrontational towards Ronda at all, but she still got the impression that she was viewed something of an intruder in the locker room rather than feeling welcome. It seemed unfair to her and made her want to leave. She decided to run through her idea of how the finish of the match could go as quickly as she could. It didn't even occur to her that she as the referee was dictating the ending of the match to the people involved in it, and that doing so might offend them. It was lucky that Devon and Naomi actually did like the idea that she had come up with.

"I like it," Devon said when Ronda was done with her pitch.

"Yeah, me too," Naomi agreed.

"Excellent," Ronda said, smiling. "Naomi, you should know that I'm going to hit you with that left hand. Not too hard, obviously, but I'm going to connect with it. I don't believe in my stuff looking shit in the ring."

Everyone looked at Naomi, wondering how she would reply to that. "I can take and sell a punch, Ronda, don't worry about that. You worry about doing your thing and I'll worry about doing mine."

"Fair enough," Ronda shrugged. "I've got to go open the show in a few minutes, so I need to go. Devon, I'm looking forward to you showing me everything you've got tonight. See you out there."

With that she left the room, leaving the three remaining women in silence for a moment before Devon said, "I'm looking forward to you showing me everything you've got? Who the fuck does she think she is? Did she buy the place while no one was looking?"

May had watched the entire exchange in silence. "Honestly? I don't think she even knows she's doing it when she talks to people like that," she said thoughtfully. "I think she's got a problem of some kind."

"Yeah, her fucking ego, that's the problem she's got," Devon huffed.

"That's your mentor you're talking about, girl," Naomi grinned. "Rather you than me."

Devon sighed. "I know. I've not even started working with her yet and I'm regretting agreeing to it."

Naomi changed the subject back to the main event and some of the bigger spots that they could possibly do in the match. All three women began to toss ideas around. Meanwhile, the show was about to go live.


	13. Chapter 13

_**NXT TakeOver**_

 _ **July 2018**_

Byron Saxton's voice opened the show as the intro music played throughout the arena and the small but raucous crowd cheered enthusiastically. "Welcome everyone, to NXT TakeOver! Byron Saxton and Booker T here at ringside. We've got a truly incredible show lined up for you tonight, and Booker, I _really_ can't wait for our main event."

"Neither can I, Byron," Booker said excitedly. "We've got Naomi taking on our NXT Women's Champion Devon Dawson, and the title _will_ be on the line. I have to say, I might be the only one in the the building, but I'm hoping to see my girl Devon walk out of here with the belt still around her waist."

Saxton laughed. "Yeah, I think you're on your own there. The rest of us have been waiting a very long time to see someone, anyone, take the title off Dawson and shut that mouth of hers in the process."

The show's intro music faded out. There was a pause for several seconds before the sound of a jet fighter flying past with afterburners lit filled the arena, followed by the theme music for Wasteland. Simultaneously the instantly recognisable RR logo filled the big screen. The deafening reaction from the crowd contained surprise as much as excitement.

"What? Don't tell me..." Booker said.

The cheering got even louder as Ronda walked out onto the stage. "Ronda Rousey is here!" Saxton yelled. "Ronda Rousey is on NXT!" He made the second sentence sound as much like a question as to why she was there rather than a statement of the fact.

Having specifically been instructed by Hunter to act like she wasn't appearing in kayfabe on this occasion and instead to behave like the 'real' Ronda Rousey that the fans loved, she walked down the short entrance ramp with a beaming smile on her face, touching hands with several fans who stretched out towards her. Even though Booker T would usually play the role of heel commentator, both he and Saxton continued to hype up her unexpected appearance as she climbed up the ring steps, entered the ring and walked over to take a microphone from the ring announcer, The crowd were still cheering loudly as her music faded out.

"It's great to see Ronda here, but _why_ is she here?" Saxton asked.

"Be quiet and we might find out," Booker said.

A truly thunderous chant of "Ronda Rousey!" had replaced her entrance music by this point, filling the small arena every bit as loudly. She had just raised her microphone to speak, but the incredible reaction caused her to laugh instead. "I'm not sure Ronda even expected this kind of reaction herself," Saxton said. "There's not a person in the crowd who isn't standing."

"Alright, let the woman talk," Booker said impatiently after the chant had gone on for at least thirty seconds, with Ronda looking around at the crowd, which only seemed to make them chant even louder.

The chant finally did begin to fade, but as soon as Ronda raised her microphone again, another chant quickly broke out. This time it was "This is awesome!" Saxton said, "Rousey has them in the palm of her hand, and she hasn't even said anything yet! They won't let her talk!"

Eventually, the second chant also began to fade and Ronda could speak at last. She laughed once more as she raised her microphone. "So, people kept telling me I should come check out NXT."

The crowd roared once more and then began to chant "NXT!"

"We _have_ got matches to put on tonight," Booker grumbled.

A few moments later, Ronda tried again. "What I kept hearing was that there are some pretty badass women down here."

There was another loud cheer, but it turned into a volley of boos as Cocky by Kid Rock began to play. It was the theme music for Devon Dawson. Ronda turned to face the stage, looking surprised by the interruption.

"Here comes the NXT Women's Champion," Saxton announced as Devon walked out onto the stage dressed in her ring gear and carrying her title belt over her shoulder. "Ronda Rousey comes down to check out NXT, and this is the response she gets? Being interrupted by this obnoxious, egotistical..."

"Careful," Booker warned as Devon sauntered down the entrance ramp. "Don't you remember Devon slapping the taste out of your mouth a few weeks ago? I do. It was great. I hope she does the same to Rousey and we might be able to get on with the show."

"Yeah, I remember," Saxton said, clearly not fond of the memory. "I really hope she _does_ do the same to Ronda. It would be the last thing she did do, that's for sure."

Devon got in the ring and sauntered up to and past Ronda, making sure to make contact with her as she did so. "Oh really?" Booker asked, almost taunting Saxton. "That's for sure, is it? Devon's the NXT Women's Champion, and I don't see a title around Rousey's waist from where I'm sitting."

In the ring, Devon now had a microphone of her own. Backstage, the production team were ready to censor the language. Even with WWE's programming now rated 14, Devon could sometimes go too far and her words would need to be bleeped. She mocked the fans by jumping up and down, pretending to cheer like an over excitable child. "Yay! Ronda Rousey is here! Yay!" She then stopped and her facial expression changed to a disrespectful sneer as she looked at Ronda. "Sorry. That was me pretending for a second like I gave a rat's ass."

The crowd booed loudly, which only seemed to encourage Devon to go on. "You're right, Rousey. This is NXT. You don't belong here. Why don't you take your ass back to the main roster and do whatever it is that you do over there instead? Like having a tag title belt for five minutes before _losing_ it? Or better yet, why don't you take your crappy movies and your stupid, childish wristbands, and get your ass back to Hollywood?"

Those comments appeared to have pissed Ronda off as much as they had the crowd, who were now booing furiously as Ronda glared at Devon. Undeterred, Devon continued with even more sarcasm. "Why are you people booing me? Huh? For calling the almighty Ronda Rousey out on the fact that she's more interested in her lame ass Hollywood 'career' than she is in wrestling? Or for having some pathetic wristband gimmick that you all buy into like the sheep that you are? Well, if calling her out pisses you off, listen up, because I'm not done."

"Dawson's going to get her head taken off in a minute if she keeps running her mouth," Saxton said. "Look at the look on Ronda's face."

"You see, Ronda," Devon continued, smiling now and talking as though she was explaining something to a person who wasn't too quick on the uptake. "You're not really a movie star. Your little movies absolutely _suck_. You're not really even a wrestler. You've never wrestled a decent match in your so-called career. The only thing you've ever even gotten close to being good at is being a referee. That's all you are, Ronda, a referee. You might have a stupid wristband gimmick and a bunch of simpletons for fans, but you're just a referee. Why don't you do us all a favour? Get out of here and leave the wrestling to the people who are interested in it; the people who are good at it."

Sick of hearing this relentless tirade of abuse, the crowd had begun to chant Ronda's name again. Surprisingly, rather than running at Devon and hitting with was the most powerful clothesline she could muster, Ronda was smiling. Finally noticing this, Devon stopped insulting her and demanded, "What? What are you smiling about?"

"I'm smiling because I'm thinking that sometimes people run their mouths and end up digging very big holes for themselves," Ronda said.

"What does she mean by that?" Saxton asked as a vague cheer came from the crowd.

"You see, if you'd stayed in the back and listened rather than letting your stupid ego drag your ass out here interrupting me, you would have heard the announcement that I was about to make."

"What announcement?" Devon asked, now looking wary.

"The announcement that I wasn't invited down here purely to check out NXT. It's ironic really, given your previous comments, that what I was invited down here to do is referee the main event tonight."

The crowd cheered loudly and Devon's mouth dropped open slightly as Saxton said, "Oh, Devon, you've just talked yourself into a world of issues."

"Why do we need Rousey to referee the main event?" Booker demanded angrily. "That's not fair, and we have our own referees anyway. This is a conspiracy, Byron, and an obvious one at that."

Devon looked as though she would very much like the opportunity to live the last five minutes of her life over again. " _You_ are refereeing _my_ title match?"

The facial expression that Ronda always wore when she was on the way to the ring for a match was famous in itself and was the subject of many internet memes. It was the look of a predator that had identified it's prey and was closing in for the kill. It appeared now as she snarled, "You're god damn right I am. I'm going to leave now, just like you asked, but I'll see you out here later, champ." There had been a significant pause for effect before the final word.

Ronda's music hit as the crowd cheered again. "You've got to believe that Devon Dawson is on borrowed time," Saxton said happily as Ronda left the ring, leaving Devon looking dumbstruck. "She came down here mouthing off at Ronda Rousey, only to find out that Rousey is the referee for her title defense tonight. That look on Devon's face was priceless."

"This really isn't fair," Booker complained. "I'm telling you, we're going to see a screwjob go down here tonight."

* * *

Much to the disappointment of the crowd, Ronda had called the match right down the middle for over ten minutes, counting near falls for both women. The action spilled to the outside, and that was where the mistake happened. Ronda was in the ring and had made it to five as she counted the two competitors out of the ring. In an attempt to gain a cheap count out victory, Devon tried to whip Naomi into one of the ring posts on the entrance side of the ring. Naomi reversed the move and sent Devon into the post instead. The usual thing in that spot was for the wrestler to block the impact with their hands and therefore prevent their head from actually meeting the post, but somehow Devon misjudged it on this occasion and failed to do so properly, causing her head to thump into the unforgiving metal.

The crowd seemed not to have noticed anything out of the ordinary as there was no significant reaction to the move or the impact, but Ronda had seen, and more importantly, heard it. Devon had gone down to a knee next to the ring post and showed no sign of getting back in the ring before Ronda made the ten count. She was already at seven as Naomi rolled into the ring beside her and muttered, "She hit the post."

"I know," Ronda replied. "Break the count."

Naomi rolled back out of the ring as instructed and Ronda followed right behind her. The most immediate problem had been solved, but she had to check on Devon, who was now trying to use the ring apron to pull herself back to her feet. After making a show of backing Naomi off, Ronda walked over to Devon, who had just regained her feet. "Are you okay?" she asked, even though the question seemed a little stupid. There was a nasty looking inch long gash on Devon's forehead, from which blood was flowing down her face.

"I'm alright, just give me a minute," Devon said, not sounding as out of it as she looked. She propped herself up on the apron with both hands. To Ronda, her eyes didn't look glazed over or glassy.

Ronda decided that Devon was indeed okay as she pulled a pair of latex gloves out of her pocket and began to put them on, which was standard practice for a WWE referee if a wrestler started to bleed in a match. "Get back in the ring," she encouraged, wanting to get the match back on track, at least to some extent.

Next, Ronda returned her attention to Naomi and once more made a show of issuing orders, this time to get back into the ring. Ronda followed Naomi in and began to count Devon out of the ring once more. Hunter's voice came through Ronda's earpiece. He was speaking from the production office backstage, having seen the bloody state that Devon was in on his monitor. "When she gets back in, get the doctor in there to clean her up," he ordered.

Right on cue, Devon rolled under the bottom rope, into the ring. Looking down at her, Ronda found herself thinking how lame it was that even though WWE's product was now rated 14, Hunter wanted the blood to be cleaned up. They no longer did that in the men's matches. Why should the women be any different? Blood added something to a wrestling match, as far as she was concerned. It made it look more realistic. It made it look better. She decided that, no, she wasn't going to get the doctor in there to clean Devon up. She had said that she was okay, and that was that. The match could go on.

"You good?" Ronda asked as Devon got to her feet in the corner of the ring. The blood was still flowing from the cut.

"Yeah," Devon said, wiping her hand across her face, smearing more blood than she actually managed to wipe off.

Ronda backed off and motioned for the two women to resume the match. Hunter's voice came once more, now sounding angry. "I said get the doctor in there, Ronda. I saw you touch your ear the first time I told you, so I know you heard me. Get him in there, now! I want that blood cleaning up and that cut looked at." The order was repeated once more a few moments later, but Ronda let the match go on. "Fine," Hunter barked. "Get your fucking ass to my office the second the match is over."

It was obvious that the boss was livid, but in the moment, Ronda didn't care. Devon was fine and the match looked good with the blood involved. She was prepared to stand by the decision that she had made. A few minutes later, it was time to bring the match to a close. Naomi attempted to hit her finishing move, the Rear View, on Devon, but the champion moved out of the way and instead Naomi hit Ronda square in the face, knocking her down.

The crowd groaned, but Ronda was already getting up as Naomi hesitated, as if checking on her. Devon attempted to capitalise on the hesitation and grabbed hold of Naomi, seemingly intending to go for her finisher, which involved getting her opponent on her shoulders in the same manner that Brock Lesnar would for his F5 and then transitioning into a double knee backbreaker. It was one of the most impressive finishing moves in women's wrestling, but on this occasion Devon didn't use it. Instead, she shoved Naomi towards Ronda as the referee got back to her feet.

With perfect timing, but also with a bit too much power, Ronda swung a left hook which connected flush with the side of Naomi's face. As soon as the punch landed, Ronda knew that it would be no stretch of the imagination at all for the fans to believe that it had knocked Naomi out cold as she fell flat on her back. They howled in a combination of surprise and horror, knowing that Devon, the woman they despised had just won the match and retained her title, even before a cover was made, as long as Ronda actually made the count. As for the audience watching on the WWE Network, Ronda knew that they would now be seeing the punch replayed multiple times in slow motion.

For a moment, Devon stared at Ronda with a look of surprise and wariness on her face, wondering if she might be the next one to get knocked out, but Ronda just glared down at the fallen Naomi. Devon scurried over and made a cover. Without pause, Ronda got down, made the three count and signaled for the bell, causing the crowd to groan yet again and drawing some boos as Devon's music hit.

Devon began to celebrate as though she had just won some kind of monumental victory. Ronda knew that the commentators would be speculating on what had just happened. Had Ronda helped Devon retain the title on purpose, or had she reacted to what she assumed was an attack from Naomi? Were Devon Dawson and Ronda Rousey on the same page? Had they been on the same page the whole time? Ronda took the NXT Women's Championship belt from the timekeeper. It was time to plant the seed even deeper with the fans. As Devon stood on the middle rope in the corner of the ring, mouthing off at the fans in celebration, Ronda walked over and stood in the middle of the ring behind her, title belt in hand.

It took a few seconds for Devon to climb down from the ropes and turn around. When she did, she flinched instinctively when she saw Ronda standing there, staring at her. Devon's music quickly faded out. The two women's eyes remained locked on each other for a long, tense moment. The cut on Devon's forehead had stopped bleeding by this point, but there was plenty of dried blood on her face. "That's my title belt," she risked saying, pointing at it.

Ronda slowly looked down at the title belt before looking back at Devon. She nodded slowly a few times, as if out of some kind of respect, and held the title out towards the champion. The crowd watched on in near silence as Devon nervously took the belt. As soon as she took it, Ronda walked over the ropes and stepped through them, leaving the ring. Rather than celebrate, Devon she stood there staring after her with a slightly confused look on her face. Devon's music started to play again as Ronda reached the stage. She knew that when she walked back through the curtain it would be time to head to Hunter's office and face music of a very different kind.


	14. Chapter 14

Ronda had hoped that when she walked back through the curtain, all would be forgiven, thanks to how well the ending of the match had gone over. As far as she was concerned, having Devon covered in blood had made it all look so much better. However, when she did walk through the curtain, she saw that there was going to be no reprieve for her latest blatant disregard of a direct order. The boss was standing there waiting for her with a very angry expression on his face.

"Let's go have a chat," Hunter growled at her.

No one within earshot believed that a chat was going to be what happened, least of all Ronda. She followed behind him as he marched along the hallway, trying to use the time to think of something to say if he started to lose his cool. Something told her that going on the offence about it being sexist to allow the men to bleed, but not the women would be a bad idea. She was ten feet behind Hunter, but she could sense the anger radiating from him. To her, it seemed like a major over-reaction to the fact that she hadn't invited the ringside doctor into the ring to wipe Devon's face with a hand towel.

Ronda was still wearing the latex gloves that she had put on in the ring. She pulled the first one off her left hand as she followed Hunter into his office, walking past him as he held the door open. Next, she noticed that some of Devon's blood had gotten onto the glove on her right hand, but then her attention focused fully on Hunter as he banged the door closed loudly behind her. Turning to look at him, she saw that he was standing between her and the door. The message was obvious: you're going nowhere until I'm finished with you.

"Why bother?" Hunter began as Ronda pulled the other glove off and stuffed them both into the pocket of her black pants - standard issue for a WWE referee. "You're the fucking doctor, right? Why don't we get Devon in here so you can examine her?"

Again, Ronda managed to make herself avoid saying something she would regret, this time something sarcastic. "Look, I asked her is she was good and she said she was, okay?"

"No! Not fucking okay!" Hunter exploded, his cheeks reddening in anger. "I told you to get the doctor in the ring. When I tell you to fucking do something, you do it!"

"You don't have to swear at me," Ronda said sulkily.

"What should I do then?" Hunter demanded, still shouting. "Maybe I should have sat down with you before the show? Oh wait, I did! Or maybe I should try getting you directly involved in the creative for your own storylines? Oh wait, I did that too! What's next, do you want me to come up with a way for you produce your matches in the back as they happen? Sorry, but that's not fucking possible!"

Ronda had backed away slightly, surprised by the intensity of his anger. "Stop shouting, please. I'm sorry, okay?"

"Not okay, not fine, not alright, not acceptable!" Hunter yelled back, but then he took a deep breath and let it out slowly, calming himself slightly. He was able to continue at something closer to a normal volume, but his anger was still more than obvious. "Not okay. You're only sorry because you're getting yelled at. You walking around thinking you can do whatever the hell you want when you're on WWE time, _my time_ , is not okay. Tell me, when whoever it is that you deal with at Adidas calls you and tells you to do something, do you fuck them around, or do you go and do it?"

"I do it," Ronda mumbled, looking down at the floor.

"So what's different about working for them compared to working for WWE? I'd really love to hear you tell me. And look at me when I'm talking to you."

Forcing herself to look up at him, Ronda nervously rubbed at her forehead with her hand. "I don't know," she shrugged weakly.

"Don't you?" Hunter replied sarcastically. "I do. Let me tell you then. Nothing, that's what's different. Fucking nothing. You don't fuck Adidas around because you know how they would deal with you. They might let you off with it the first time, but they wouldn't hesitate to pull their sponsorship off you if you started to become a problem. And you know what? That's exactly what I'm going to do."

"What does that mean?" Ronda asked, narrowing her eyes in confusion.

"What that means is, _I'm_ the one who wanted to re-sign you. _I'm_ the one who wanted to push you. _I'm_ the one who wanted to make you the second-ever female I.C. champion. _I'm_ the one who wanted to try for the second time to make you one of the faces of this company. Well, no more. NPD or not, your conduct and your attitude are both unacceptable."

Ronda felt a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. "What do you mean by that?" she asked. She had a feeling she knew what was coming, but needed to hear him spell it out, as if that might make it any better.

Hunter's tone conveyed the fact that his mind was made up and would not be changed. "I mean you're not getting a push, you're not getting the I.C. title, you're not even going to wrestle on my shows until I say otherwise. You're going to learn a lesson you should have been forced to learn a long time ago, which is that no one is bigger than WWE, certainly not Ronda Rousey. You're going to learn how to eat shit and like the taste of it, to coin a phrase."

"But..." Ronda tried to cut in, feeling tears start to well up in her eyes.

"But nothing," Hunter barked, not giving her a chance to say anything. "I'm talking. When my mouth is open, yours stays shut. Not only is your attitude appalling, I think it could well end up being contagious, so you're not going to be mentoring Devon, either. What you're going to do is simple: You're going to be at the shows you're booked on, you're going to arrive on time, and you're going to do exactly what you're told, when you're told, _without_ any attitude. Do I make myself perfectly clear?"

Already feeling stunned and devastated by what she had just heard, Ronda was hit by another realisation. She was going to have to explain to Seth, to Maggie, and to Ric, that she had blown her Intercontinental title run by disrespecting Hunter and WWE again. The looks of disappointment on their faces would be torture for her. What was even worse was how stupid it seemed now that she looked back on it. All she had been told to do was get the doctor in the ring to clear the blood off of Devon's face. Why couldn't she just have listened, done as she was told, and fought the battle on the bleeding in women's matches at some other time, in private? At that moment, she knew for sure that she would never disregard an order from Hunter again, or do anything else that would be considered unprofessional by WWE. The problem was that it was too late. She could see in his eyes that he wasn't going to back down on anything he had just said.

"I said do I make myself clear?" Hunter said, getting angry again at her failure to reply.

"Crystal," Ronda said, feeling a surprising sense of determination coming over her. "I'll prove to you that I want to be here, that I want to work for you and WWE. I'm going to get treatment for this fucking NPD thing, and I'll prove it to you. I'll make you think that signing me back here was the best decision you ever made."

The expression on Hunter's face made it obvious that he thought what he was hearing was all hot air; words with no real substance to them. He opened the door and gestured with his head. "Just go."

"What about the Evolution storyline?" Ronda asked, not heading for the door.

"You don't have to wrestle matches for that to happen. Now get out before I take you out of that as well. You'll be informed of your new creative Monday night."

Ronda wanted to ask about her match with Randy Orton, which was only a week and a half away, but she decided to take the fact that it hadn't been mentioned as a positive and leave before things got worse. She hurried past Hunter and out of the office.

Rather than slam the door closed and then put his fist through it, Hunter forced himself to regain his composure and close it normally. Having done so, he walked over and sat down at his desk. Losing his cool and screaming at his employees wasn't usually his style, and he didn't like doing it. But he didn't feel guilty about having done so on this occasion. If anything, it was overdue where Ronda was concerned. There was only so far he could allow someone to push him. NPD or not, fan favourite or not, huge ratings draw or not, Ronda Rousey would get her ass in line the same as everyone else. He had decided that it was zero tolerance as far as she was concerned from this point forward.

Further down the hallway, Ronda had rushed into her locker room and immediately turned her phone on to call Seth. By the time he answered the call, she was crying.

"What's wrong, babe?" he asked, concerned, but also confused as to what could possibly have upset her.

Ronda proceeded to tell the whole story, having to repeat some parts because her tears made it hard for Seth to understand what she was saying. It was when she got to the part about knowing that she wouldn't do anything to step out of line again, but having no way to make Hunter believe her, that she really broke down. The worst part was that she wasn't even convinced that Seth believed her either when he replied with, "I know, babe. I know."

"No!" Ronda snapped heatedly. "Don't blow me off. I'm fucking serious. I swear, I'm going to take whatever Hunter throws at me and I'm going to work my fucking way back to the top. I'm going to get treatment for this bastard NPD too. I want you to be proud of me. I want Maggie to be proud of me, Ric to be proud of me. I want my dad to look down and be proud of me." The tears started to flow again. Ronda's father had taken his own life when she was young. It was something that she had never been able to fully come to terms with, and it was a constant source of pain which she tried to hide from the world. Right now, it was too painful to hide.

"Don't say that," Seth said. "Your dad is proud of you. I'm sure he's always looking down and feeling proud of you."

"No," Ronda said again, quietly this time. "I think he's looking down thinking I can be a lot better than I am. I can be the best female wrestler, rather than just acting like it. I think he's pulling for me to be the best I can be. Actually, I know he is. I'm going to do it, Seth. I'm going to win that IC title and I'm going to dedicate it to my dad. I don't care how hard I have to work to get there, or how much shit I have to eat."

Seth found the final sentence to be a very strange thing to say, but chose not to question it. He sensed sheer determination in his fiancee's voice, and he knew that when she got into that mindset she would do exactly as she said. "Okay. I hear you. I hear you, I believe in you, and I'm here to support you. That day will come. We'll both make sure of it. I love you."

"I love you too. I'll be leaving in a few minutes and I'm flying home. I'll be late, but I'll be there." Ronda said, feeling so grateful that Seth had a rare night at home, and feeling so much better knowing that she wasn't in the fight alone. There was only direction to go when you were at rock bottom: upwards.


	15. Chapter 15

Seth had been surprised to say the least when Ronda had announced that she had arranged for them to go on a double dinner date with Sarita Lopez and Randy Orton. Not only was Ronda not usually one to mix with anyone else at WWE on her own time, aside from Roman and Dean, it was well known that there had been some serious bad blood between her and Sarita in the past. While it was true that the two women had shaken hands and agreed to be civil and professional with each other months ago, it was another thing entirely for them to now be going for a meal together on a Friday night. Given that she didn't have to work house shows, Ronda had even had to fly out specifically to be there. Seth hoped that it was a sign of progress, because her NPD was causing problems again. Not between them, but between her and WWE, specifically Hunter.

The latest flare up had been a couple of days earlier at an NXT Takeover Pay-Per-View, when Ronda had ignored a direct order from him. It had pushed him beyond breaking point, resulting in him changing his mind regarding the run as Intercontinental champion that she had been promised. The decision had devastated Ronda, and she had called Seth from her locker room immediately afterwards, breaking down in tears. While his fiancee being so upset had obviously been unpleasant to say the least for Seth, he had also been encouraged by the determination with which she had announced that she was going to move forward and work with her therapist to deal with her NPD, if that was indeed what she had. That would be crucial to getting her head straight so she could focus on doing her job when she was on WWE's time, as she had to when she worked for Adidas or Oakley. Apparent determination or not, words were one thing and actions were another, especially where Ronda and her NPD were concerned. This wasn't the first time she had said that she would change the way she acted, and thus far she was still proving to be her own worst enemy.

After Seth got out of the car that had driven them from their hotel to the restaurant where they would be meeting Sarita and Randy, he straightened his dark grey suit jacket and adjusted the collar of the black shirt that he had on underneath it. Fine food and expensive restaurants were a passion of his, and over the course of their first relationship, they had become a passion for Ronda too.

Seth held the car door open for Ronda and she climbed out. They definitely knew how to dress when visiting places like this. He decided that there was no doubt about it, they both looked great. Seth considered that while wearing makeup and expensive dresses like the black sleeveless number with side cutouts and cross diamond-studded clippings that she had on now were not things that Ronda enjoyed as much as a lot of other women, when she made the effort, the results were always outstanding. Ronda let out a frustrated sounding groan as he closed the car door. "What's up, babe?"

"Everywhere you fucking go, there's some asshole taking pictures," Ronda whined, gesturing down the street at a photographer who wasn't making much of an attempt to be discreet about what he was doing.

"Look on the bright side," Seth said as he took her hand and headed for the restaurant's entrance. "At least we both look great."

" _You_ look great," Ronda emphasized. "I just feel awkward dressing up like this."

Seth glanced at her and fought the urge to smile. "You need to spend more time with Nikki then, you'll soon get used to it. Anyway, you've got nothing to feel awkward about. You look beautiful. Relax and enjoy yourself, that's what we're here to do. God knows we don't get the chance to do this kind of thing together often enough."

A doorman held the restaurant's door open for them and they walked in, Ronda linking her arm with Seth's as they did so. Sarita and Randy were already there, apparently having just arrived themselves. They were talking to a middle aged man with short blonde hair who was wearing a suit that looked to be about as expensive as Seth's. "Must be the manager," Seth said under his breath.

"What, you've never eaten here before?" Ronda was genuinely surprised. Seth seemed to know the best restaurants in every city that WWE went to, although in some places that wasn't exactly saying much.

"No, never," Seth said as they approached their two colleagues. Referring to Sarita and Randy as friends would have been stretching things a little.

Greetings were exchanged, with Sarita drawing a rare smile from Ronda by telling her that her dress looked incredible. The manager showed them to a table towards the back of the restaurant. Seth recognized a lot of signs that this would be the kind of place he liked. The tables were spaced out just the right amount so that the restaurant looked busy, but a relaxed atmosphere was provided for customers at the same time. The lighting was also just right, and he saw several waiters walking around. Their table would get high quality, efficient, and personal yet professional service, just the way it should be at a place that charged top dollar. "Nice place you picked here, Randy," Seth said after they had been left to look over their menus.

"Yeah, I first came here years ago, with Hunter and Steph actually. I think Vince used to eat here, too."

"All three of your biggest fans, Ronda," Sarita laughed. News of the roasting that Ronda had received from Hunter had obviously gotten around quickly, as everything seemed to behind the scenes at WWE.

Ronda had decided before leaving the hotel that she was going to try her absolute best not to let her NPD ruin the night for everyone, including herself. That was the worst thing about it; it made her just as miserable as everyone else around her, and it was harming her career too. Already it was a battle to laugh at Sarita's joke rather than snapping at her about minding her own business, but she did manage to laugh. "I should get them some honorary wristbands or something. We're lucky this meal didn't turn into a waste of time. I thought Hunter was going to scrap this RKO match when he was losing his shit at me the other night. I've never seen the guy like that before. His face went red, he was yelling at me at the top of his voice, it was fucking crazy."

The other three people at the table all felt a little uncomfortable with Ronda's swearing, given where they were, and the fact that she was talking quite loudly. At least one other person had glanced in their table's direction, but Ronda carried on, oblivious. "He told me no IC title, in fact I'm hardly even going to be wrestling for the time being. I thought he was going to take me out of this new Evolution too, but apparently not. I'm definitely top of his shit list though, that's for sure. In fact, according to him, I'm going to have to learn to eat shit and like the taste of it."

"Well, you won't be eating shit here," Randy grinned.

A waiter arrived, introduced himself, and took their drink orders: wine for the women, beer for the guys. When he left, a slightly awkward silence descended on the table for a moment. It seemed that everyone wanted to talk about something other than work, but no one knew what to say. "I really like those shoes, Ronda," Sarita said, as much to break the silence as to actually pay the compliment.

"Thanks. Nikki and I went shopping Monday. We bought the shoes and the dress. She's great at finding something that looks good on me." Ronda had looked at Sarita's dress as she spoke. She was sure that the guys liked it, given that it did a great job of showing off her two prized assets. "Yours is uh, perfect for you. I mean, it looks great."

It was noticeable how quickly Seth cut in to change the subject, asking Randy about the movie that he was about to be taking time off to film. The drinks arrived a couple of minutes later, and the conversation finally began to flow a little more freely, with the men and women separated into their own conversations. Ronda was surprised that she found herself genuinely interested in talking to Sarita about how she had gone from being a lingerie model to a professional wrestler and multi-time Divas champion. It was a very different story to Ronda's own, that was for sure, but she found it admirable in its own way. Hard work and commitment were things that she had always respected, and Sarita had proven herself to be more than a pair of fake boobs and a pretty face.

Ronda decided that she was happy to be a part of this new Evolution team, and that she actually respected the other three women involved in it. It made her wonder if this supposed NPD thing that Seth and Maggie assumed she had really existed. Maybe it was just her approach to people, to life in general, that was wrong? It was definitely true that her first instinct when approaching something or someone new was to see the negatives rather than the positives. She considered that this was totally the opposite of how Maggie, her closest friend, lived her life, and she had gone through hard times the likes of which Ronda couldn't imagine. Even breaking her neck couldn't be compared to being run down and crushed by a car, and having both legs amputated as a result, which was what had happened to Maggie when she was younger.

Starters were served along with another round of beers for Seth and Randy. "So, what are you going to be calling the RKO when you use it?" Randy asked Ronda.

Ronda poured herself another glass of wine as she replied. "They suggested I call it the RRKO."

"Huh?" Randy scrunched up his face in confusion. "Ronda Rousey Keith Orton? Okay, if that's what you want..."

Seth and Sarita laughed, and their laughter got louder when Ronda said, "That's what RKO means? And your middle name's _Keith_?" The genuine surprise in her voice was what sold it, making everyone at the table laugh.

"Could be worse, man," Seth said, grinning. "Hers is _Jean_."

To her own surprise, Ronda found herself laughing along with everyone else. She wondered if it was having Seth beside her that made her feel more relaxed and kept her in check. She felt certain that in other circumstances she would have lost her cool over being laughed at. It made her wonder if she would have done some of the stupid things that she had done during her first run with WWE if Seth had been as supportive back then as he was being now, the second time around? Maybe not, but she didn't want to have to rely on Seth to be there for her all the time, like some kind of minder. Her first therapy session couldn't come soon enough, as far as she was concerned. Talking things through with someone who actually knew what they were talking about would surely be a huge help, and a weight off her mind. Setting those thoughts aside, she grinned at Randy. "If they ever put us on a team, we can be Team Shit Middle Names."

The joke fell a little flat, so Randy said, "Seriously though, RRKO is lame, in fact it makes no sense, even if it does mean Ronda Rousey Knock Out. I have to assume that's what they were going for. You need something better than that."

"Hmmm," Sarita said thoughtfully as she loaded her fork with a piece of smoked salmon and some of the beetroot salad that came with it. "Maybe something Hollywood related? It'll fit with your new heel character and the Evolution style."

"The move is a jumping cutter," Seth said. "What about, uh, Final Cut?"

Ronda looked at him as she chewed a mouthful of food, considering the idea, but Sarita snapped her fingers and smiled. "I've got it, guys. Director's Cut. It's Hollywood, and it's obvious they're going to write you as the leader of the team, even if Steph does the talking. When we outnumber people and beat them down, you'll be directing traffic. Kind of a play on words or something."

A grin appeared on Ronda's face as she nodded slowly. "Director's Cut. I like that. I really do like it. I think you nailed it, girl. I'll tell Hunter that's what I want it to be called when I see him Sunday. I need to apologize to him anyway, after the other night."

Seth sat and enjoyed the rest of his starter in silence as Ronda told Sarita and Randy about what had happened at the NXT event and in Hunter's office afterwards. She spoke frankly and honestly about it, admitting her own wrongdoing, which Seth recognised as something significant. He took confidence from it and smiled at Ronda as she glanced at him while answering a question from Sarita. She looked happy. He felt happy. Everyone at the table was enjoying the night so far. The woman sitting next to him right now was the Ronda that he had fallen in love with way back when, the Ronda that he considered to be the _real_ Ronda. This was the Ronda that hadn't been affected by being one of WWE's star attractions, the Ronda that hadn't had literally millions of people feeding her ego. This was the Ronda that he wanted to be married to, the Ronda that he would be _proud_ to be married to. The obvious problem was that this Ronda's appearances were relatively few and far between at present. He knew that it was up to him to be the one to be there for her and to keep her grounded as much and as often as possible, without being too obvious about it. Living with someone with NPD was certainly a challenge, but Seth's heart could not be denied when it came to Ronda. She was the one for him, flaws and all, and he knew that she felt the same way about him. They were meant to be together. It was just that simple.

With the starters finished with, Sarita headed for a bathroom break and Randy made his way outside for a smoke. As they walked away from the table, Ronda looked at Seth and rubbed her forehead with her right hand, a sure sign of stress. "I'm trying, Seth. I'm really fucking trying." She hadn't said it as if she was expecting gratitude or praise, instead she had seemed to be hoping that he would realise that she was making the effort and doing her best to make the evening enjoyable for everyone.

"I know, babe," Seth said softly, taking her hand. "And I know it's not easy. You must be happy though, right? We're all having a good time."

"Of course," Ronda said, leaning towards him for a delicate kiss. "I'm always happy when I'm with you."

That was the best thing Seth had heard all night.


	16. Chapter 16

_**Battleground 2018**_

"I'm still not happy that they changed our finish," Ronda said as she approached Randy Orton, who was waiting in Gorilla. The video promo for their match was running in the arena, meaning that it would not be long before her music would hit.

"I thought you had that silent routine before matches?" Randy asked, a weak attempt at humour.

"No point when everything's unsettling me anyway," she said offhandedly.

A hint of irritation flashed in Randy's eyes. "This is hardly the time to be complaining. Trust me, I know from experience. This is a big match, especially for you, and we need to deliver, even if the creative sucks. Focus."

Seeming not to pay much attention to what he said or bother thinking back to any of the well publicised times Randy had been the one in hot water with WWE, Ronda continued complaining. "They change our finish to make my win cheaper, they give us this crappy time limit to work with because everyone else went too long. I keep getting cheered when I'm supposed to be a heel, and I have to enter first. I never enter first. It changes my whole routine. I'm supposed to have the time it takes you to get to the ring to myself, to get myself in the right place. They even made me take my wristband off too now. This is fucking stupid."

"Then complain about it after the show's over," Randy bristled. "I'm sure Hunter would love to hear another bunch of complaints from you. I definitely don't want to hear them. We've got a match to put on." Inside, Randy was starting to get heated himself. Before he could point out the obvious flaw in her complaints; that she had a problem with the fans continuing to cheer her, but also had a problem with being asked not to wear her wristband, which symbolised her connection with the them, Ronda's music hit, drawing a cheer from the crowd. It was nothing compared to some of the reactions she had gotten in the past, but it was still a cheer for a heel character. Randy saw her close her eyes when she heard it, in obvious frustration. Although he didn't understand her at all, rather than snap at her or be sarcastic, Randy decided to be the bigger person and try to help her instead, reasoning that he had worked with plenty of difficult people in the past and had been able to put on good matches with them.

"Look, you've got this," he said reassuringly. "We've got this. It's going to be a great match, okay? Get your game face on." He held out his right fist for Ronda to bump, knowing that it was something she would routinely do with her opponents right before they entered the arena.

"Okay," Ronda agreed, showing the faintest hint that she appreciated the words of confidence. She bumped Randy's fist with her left and walked through the curtain, to another cheer.

Randy shook his head and mumbled to himself, imagining that he was talking to Seth. "I don't know how do it, man. In fact, I don't know if I should give you a medal or a slap for putting up with her. At least she's only my problem for tonight."

* * *

"And here she comes," Byron Saxton said as Ronda walked into the arena, looking focused and ready to go. "Ronda Rousey is someone I'm very disappointed with, guys. She used to be someone for the fans to look up too, a role model, someone who fought the good fight, but since she came back with this new attitude, the attitude of a Hollywood star, she's changed completely, and not for the better."

"Right," Lawler agreed. "The only thing that Ronda Rousey cares about is Ronda Rousey. So much so that she's even resorted to sucking up to Stephanie McMahon to try and get ahead."

"Don't be ridiculous," JBL retorted. "Ronda and Stephanie are friends. They're both beautiful, they're both rich, and they're the two most powerful women in WWE. There's no sucking up involved at all. And anyway, what did you expect Ronda to do, accept being RKO'd by Orton, twice? All that did was piss her off. I think Ronda's going to beat Orton here, I really do. Remember, all she's got to do is hit an RKO and Orton is gone. He's the one with it all to lose here tonight. All the pressure is on him."

Ronda was now in the ring. Her music faded out as she continued to limber up in the corner of the ring closest to the time keeper's position. There were cheers from the crowd, but the Ronda Rousey chants were conspicuous by their absence.

A mixture of cheers and boos greeted Randy Orton when his music hit. The commentators recapped his rivalry with Ronda while he made his walk to the ring and then stood on the middle rope in the opposite corner to her, adopting his familiar pose.

Lillian Garcia walked into the middle of the ring to make her introductions when Randy's music faded out and he dropped down from the ropes. She had been specifically instructed to wait until now to give the match what Hunter had referred to as the big match feel. "The following contest is an RKO match! The winner will be the first person to deliver an RKO to their opponent. Should Randy Orton lose the match, he will be forced to leave WWE indefinitely." She paused for a second before introducing the competitors. "Introducing first, from Venice, California, Ronda Rousey!"

Ronda appeared not to notice the cheer, keeping her steely gaze locked on Orton as she blew on her fingers, warming them up, the last part of her preparation routine.

"And her opponent, from St. Louis, Missouri, weighing in at two hundred and thirty five pounds, Randy Orton!" Another cheer from the crowd, who seemed unsure who they were actually supposed to be rooting for in this contest.

Referee Charles Robinson ordered the bell to be sounded. "Here we go," Saxton said enthusiastically. "Rousey and Orton. For the first time in many years, we have a woman going one on one with a man in a WWE ring."

Showing no intimidation or nerves, Ronda met Orton in the middle of the ring and locked up with him, attempting to take him down with a judo throw.

"Rousey trying to take it to Orton early," JBL said.

Whereas Ronda usually had no problem throwing her opponents around the ring almost at will, she failed to take Orton down because he used his significant strength advantage to push her away from him and into the ropes. As she hit the ropes, he jumped up in an attempt to hit an RKO, but Ronda managed to grab the ropes with both hands, stopping herself before she ran into an early disaster.

"Oh! Orton nearly ended it in the opening thirty seconds," Lawler said.

Ronda dropped to the mat and rolled out of the ring to the floor, drawing some boos from the crowd.

Saxton said, "Rousey buying herself some time here. She looks a little shaken by how easily Orton fought her off and then nearly got the RKO. Maybe she needs to change up her gameplan. She doesn't have her usual power advantage in this one."

Randy climbed through the ropes, dropped to the floor and walked around the ring after Ronda, who had now walked around to the side of the ring where the commentary tables were. "Orton not wanting to give Rousey time to compose herself," Lawler said.

Randy walked around the corner of the ring and into Ronda's trap. There was no technique or style in her offence on this occasion, in fact it was a swift kick between the legs, sending Randy collapsing to the floor with his hands covering the affected area.

"Ball game!" JBL called out, making a point of laughing loudly at his own joke.

The distinctly unsportsmanlike act gave Ronda the upper hand for the opening five minutes of the match. She worked at a very deliberate pace, given that her usual powerful offence was largely unavailable to her. Instead, she worked on his right leg with strike attacks and submission holds, until he was able to make it back to his feet, duck underneath an attempted clothesline and connect with his signature reverse backbreaker. As if acting on instinct alone, Randy made a cover. The crowd counted to three and Saxton pointed out, "In any other match it would have been over right there, but not this one. Only an RKO will get the job done here."

Randy now had control and hit Ronda with several powerful moves over the course of the next few minutes, without going for a second attempt at an RKO. "Rousey's struggling here," JBL said, sounding concerned.

Ronda was whipped hard into the corner of the ring. Randy ran in as fast as he could in an attempt to crush her against the turnbuckles, but Ronda moved aside at the last moment, leaving Randy to crash into the corner himself, chest first. In the past this had been the setup for Ronda's finishing clothesline, but that move hadn't been seen since she had turned heel, as if she was purposefully denying it to the fans. Instead she waited behind Randy for him to stagger backwards before grabbing him around the waist. Using his momentum to help her, she managed to deliver an impressive looking German suplex, bringing a cheer from the crowd.

"I told you, boys," JBL said gleefully. "Don't underestimate Ronda Rousey. She's no ordinary woman. Come on, Ronda! Stay on him! You've got this!"

"Ugh, please stop," Saxton groaned. "As if Rousey wasn't bad enough sucking up to Stephanie, you're doing it to her!"

Now back in control, Ronda would not allow Randy back to his feet, connecting with well measured punches and kicks to his right leg or his head every time he tried to get up. The offence was not attractive, but it was effective in keeping Randy down. It did nothing to get the fans into the match, though. It was never a good sign when they sat and watched a match in near silence, which had been the case for large portions of this one. As both competitors had feared, the poor creative was letting them down. Worse was to come for the finish.

"I've to admit I'm surprised," Lawler said. "I thought Rousey would be outmatched here, but she's actually in control of Randy Orton. Wait..." Randy had grabbed hold of Ronda's leg as she swung another kick at him. Taking advantage of her precarious position, he swept her other leg out from under her, causing her to fall onto her back.

"Oh, Orton back to his feet quickly," Saxton called out. Ronda got up quickly also, but made the mistake of running at him. "Powerslam! Orton now with the upper hand."

"He's hearing those voices," Lawler said, hyping it up as Orton sold his build up for the RKO to the crowd. He was about to go down to the mat to begin pounding it with his hands when the voice of a young boy came through the arena's speaker system.

"Can I have a Ronda Rousey shirt please? A blue one?"

A familiar female voice answered, "Sure you can sweetheart."

"What the... What's going on?" Saxton asked quietly when a shot of a merchandise stand appeared on the big screen above the entrance. Devon Dawson was working the stand, selling a shirt to the boy whose voice had just been heard. His father was handing over some money to pay for the shirt. Ironically, the voices had distracted Randy when he looked like he was about to win. For a moment, he took his eyes off Ronda and looked at the screen, confused. It was the small opening that she needed. When he turned back around, Ronda was already jumping high in the air.

"She got him!" JBL yelled at the top of his voice as Ronda hit a textbook perfect RKO, leaving Randy flat on his face. Some of the crowd cheered, but the reaction definitely couldn't be described as great.

"No way!" Saxton exclaimed, horrified, but the bell had already been rung. The match was over. "Randy Orton is gone. Rousey got the RKO, thanks to a distraction from Devon Dawson of all people. I have to believe that the distraction was meant for Rousey. There's certainly no love lost between those two ladies."

Ronda's music didn't hit because the video clip was still playing on the screen. "Sshhh," Lawler urged his colleague. "What's going on here?"

Another child approached the merchandise stand. This time it was a young girl, again accompanied by her father. "Can I get a Ronda Rousey wristband?"

"Say please," the father urged, smiling.

"Please," the child added.

"Absolutely," Devon said, smiling herself. "I got a whole box of Rousey wristbands back here." She turned around and picked up a large cardboard box which she then set on top of the stand in front of her customers. She pulled a wristband out of the box and tore open the packaging. "One wristband." Instead of handing it over right away, Devon picked up a pair of scissors, cut the wristband in half and then held the ruined pieces out to the child. "There you are, little one," she said, so sweetly that it was obviously fake.

The child burst into tears at the sight of the ruined wristband, but Devon wasn't done. She had already ripped open the packing on another wristband. Cutting that one in half too, she angrily yelled at the young girl, "How about another one?"

The father glared at Devon and lead his distraught daughter away. Devon threw the ruined pieces of the two wristbands after them, then turned to face the camera. "Rousey! I got a whole stand full of all your crap here. You want to know what I think of your stupid wristbands?" She cut another one in half. "That's what I think of them. These wristbands, all of this garbage with your stupid little logo on? I'll show you exactly what I think of all of it."

Angrily, she threw the box of wristbands into the empty hallway. A stack of T-shirts followed it. Devon picking up another box, opened it and looked inside. "What's this crap? Caps?" she yelled, sounding incredulous as much as angry now. "Ronda Rousey caps? Are these seriously supposed to be stylish? I mean, do people actually wear this garbage? Pathetic." The box of caps joined the pile of discarded items in the hallway.

"You know what I'm going to do with all of this junk, Rousey?" she said to the camera. She then picked up a gas can which had been stashed behind the stand, making sure the camera could see it, walked around the stand, up to the pile of pile of merchandise and began to pour gas onto it. "It's time for all of this stupid merch, all of the endorsements, all of the movies, to go! All of it!"

When the gas can was emptied and the merchandise fully soaked, Devon tossed the can aside and pulled one last wristband out of her pocket along with a lighter. She set the wristband alight and scowled into the camera. "Soon, Rousey. Soon." The words were clearly meant to be a threat. With that, Devon tossed the burning wristband onto the pile of merchandise, which was instantly engulfed in flames.

The shot remained on the fire for several moments before three referees appeared with fire extinguishers and put it out. When the fire was out, the shot zoomed in on the destroyed remains of the Ronda Rousey merchandise, then faded out.

"Devon Dawson is out of control," Saxton said, sounding like he was shaking his head.

Ronda was now standing in front of the stage, staring up at the screen, looking shocked by what she had just had to watch. She headed for the back as Lawler mumbled, almost to himself, "Soon, Rousey. What was that supposed to mean?"

JBL muttered a reply, sounding concerned. "Nothing good."

* * *

Backstage in the production office, Hunter leaned back in his chair and sighed. "Now I remember why we stopped having matches with women wrestling men. They stink the place out. There was no chemistry between them, no story telling, nobody bought into it. They've killed the crowd for the main event. Thank God I changed my mind about the IC title."

"You're being a bit harsh," Ric Flair said. He had decided to join the man he considered to be his close friend first and his boss second in watching the match. After all, Ronda was his protegee in all but an official capacity. Ric knew deep down though that Hunter was right; the match had sucked and killed the crowd in the process. But that was down to the creative at least as much as the two people in the ring.

Hunter looked at Ric and shook his head. "No I'm not, you know that. The question is, what do I do now? She's too good to make her anything other than dominant against the Divas, but she can't cut it with the guys." Frustrated, he rubbed his eyes with his right hand. "What do you know, Ronda Rousey is a problem even when she's not doing something crazy or stupid."

Ric contemplated that for a moment in silence. He knew that Ronda would be equally upset about the match had gone, if not more so. The opportunity to headline a pay-per-view had meant a lot to her. She had told him as much earlier in the day over a cup of coffee. What was really needed was a way for her to wrestle every week without ridiculous amounts of hype around her so that she could gradually work her way back into Hunter's favour while at the same time dealing with her other issues with her therapist, the first session having already been booked for the coming Wednesday. A potential solution came to mind. "You're about to start this female Evolution stable. Why don't you put her on a team? Have her tag with Sarita Lopez. I think tag matches could really suit her. True, she'd be better on a face team, coming in on a hot tag with her power offence, but I think we could really make this work."

"Interesting the way you put that," Hunter said thoughtfully. "We could make this work."

"What are you thinking?"

"I'm thinking you could be the agent for Ronda's matches. You get along with her, and she actually listens to you which is more than anyone else can say. It's a great idea. We'll have her tag with Lopez and you can be the agent for their matches, if you're up for it of course."

Ric didn't hesitate. He would enjoy doing it, and Ronda needed the help. "Sure, I'll do it. I'll tell her tomorrow before the show. Don't forget that she's starting therapy next week, too. She really is trying, H, although it might not look like it right now."

"We'll see," Hunter said, returning his attention to his monitor. The main event was about to start.


	17. Chapter 17

Seth was surprised, and not just by the fact that Ronda was singing along to the trashy pop song that was playing out of the rental car's stereo system. No, what surprised him even more was that she was doing it as he was driving her to her first therapy session.

It had been over a week since he had booked the appointment with Jenna Wilson, who was one of the recommendations that Hunter had passed on to them. A week probably didn't seem like much of a period of time to most people, but in the wrestling business a lot could happen in very short periods of time. That had certainly been the case this past week. Seth and Ronda had been on a double date with Sarita Lopez and Randy Orton, which had gone well, and then Ronda had wrestled Randy at Battleground, which most definitely hadn't gone well.

Seth thought back to the reaction that the match had gotten from the fans and from the so-called experts. One article had been particularly harsh, and of course Ronda's critics - who it seemed were growing in numbers quite rapidly since she started working a program with Orton - had made sure to bring it to her attention on social media.

Ronda Rousey: Out of ideas, out of place, and out of shape. That had been the title of the piece, which went on to hammer WWE for their awful creative work, especially in the Orton match. The way that Ronda was being bounced between storylines with no apparent direction was also heavily criticised, along with the fact that she was being booked to wrestle men when the Divas division was itself floundering once more. The worst part of the article as far as Seth and Ronda were concerned was the final part, which criticised Ronda personally for some poor performances, lack of ability on the mic, and worst of all, for looking out of shape. The comment that stuck was: Maybe we should be seeing more pictures of Rousey going into gyms, rather than restaurants? The carefully chosen pictures of her in 2015 and one of her lying on the canvas in the ring at Battleground which appeared as though she had the beginnings of a double chin, certainly hadn't helped.

Frankly, Seth was inclined to agree with the points relating to WWE and their poor creative and booking for Ronda. She had been booked to win the Tag Team Championship with Brock Lesnar, but had then lost the titles after only a couple of weeks. Following that there had been the program with Orton, which had turned out to be nothing more than a badly written mess to get Orton off TV for a couple of months for him to film a movie.

And yet Ronda was happy. She was singing along to the radio as though she was having the time of her life.

"You're in a good mood today, babe," Seth said with a smile, loudly enough to be heard over the music.

Ronda stopped singing and smiled back at him as he turned the volume down. "Of course. This is when I'm at my best. I love it when people tell me I suck, tell me I can't do this, I'm no good at that, all of that shit. You know why? Because I know I _can_ , and that means I get to prove them wrong. Everyone told me I couldn't make the Olympics. I made it. Everyone told me I couldn't do well at the Olympics. I won bronze; would have won gold if the fucking ref in my first round match knew his ass from his elbow and didn't blow the first call he had to make. Now people want to say I'm out of shape, can't talk on the mic and can't wrestle? Fuck them. I'll show them. You have my back and Ric has my back now that he's going to be the agent for my matches. All this bullshit does is motivate me. This is when I thrive, honey."

"That's just the right... Hey, you called me honey," Seth said, laughing in surprise.

"What?" Ronda giggled.

"You just called me honey, without realising it apparently."

Noticing how pleased Seth seemed to be about it, Ronda laughed happily. "Well, I guess it's a better nickname than asshole. I reserve the right to call you asshole when you deserve it, though."

It was one of those moments that Seth wished would happen more often. They were together and having a great time in each other's company, plus Ronda had a stunning smile when she actually used it. "Okay," he agreed with a chuckle. "You can call me asshole, but only if I'm being an asshole."

"Deal, asshole," Ronda said, laughing again and leaning over to kiss him on the cheek. She then leaned back in her seat and wondered aloud, "Maybe I should call Hunter an asshole? It's his overall responsibility for the way I'm being booked, and people are right, it fucking sucks. Lesnar for no reason, Orton for no reason, and now Evolution - tagging with Sarita. What's the point? I've never even been on a team before."

"Well, don't call Hunter an asshole," Seth cautioned. "But yeah, the creative you've had has sucked pretty hard. I think you'll like tagging with Sarita, though. You always said you wanted to play a heel, and it should be easy to get heat in a stable with Steph. She's so good at it. Tag matches are easy to get heat in anyway, cheating, double teams, all the rest of it. They're also good for your style in the ring, when things inevitably go wild towards the finish. You get along with Sarita, so yeah, like I said, I think you'll enjoy it."

Seth paused for a moment, concentrating on getting in the correct lane at an intersection. "As for creative? Let them worry about it. They'll write good stuff for you, and they'll write garbage. That's just how it goes. You have to go out there and give it the best you have, regardless."

While she was listening to Seth, Ronda had looked at the screen of the satnav and had seen the marker that indicated their destination. They were only a couple of minutes away. The female computerised voice requested Seth take a right turn up ahead to reach his destination. Ronda began to feel nervous because she didn't know what to expect when she walked into the building, and she hated that. "Nearly there," she said, stating the obvious.

"You okay?" Seth asked, stopping the car at a red light.

"Starting to feel nervous," Ronda admitted. "But I'm going into this with an open mind. I want the fucking help, so there's no point being stupid about it."

Within a few minutes they were walking into the waiting room of the therapist's office. By that point, Seth was starting to doubt his own diagnosis. According to what he had read, if Ronda had NPD she would be acting differently right now, a lot differently. Still, he reasoned, the main thing was that she was here and willing to work with the therapist, at least at the outset.

They took seats in the small, nicely furnished and well presented waiting area, having been directed by a receptionist after filling out a couple of forms. It didn't escape Seth that he and Ronda were the only people there. He felt sure that was by design. It was natural for people to feel awkward about seeing a therapist, and that would be made worse by having to sit around other people. It also appeared deliberate that the wait was no more than a couple of minutes before the door to the doctor's office opened.

Jenna Wilson didn't look anything like what Seth had expected, especially the fact that she didn't look any older than he was. She was short, he guessed five feet three, and had short blonde hair worn in a small ponytail. At least the warm, pleasant smile on her face was no surprise.

"Ronda? Would you like to come through?"

Seth was unsure if he was supposed to go in with Ronda. As his name hadn't been mentioned, he assumed not, settling for giving her hand a reassuring squeeze as she stood up. At least he had brought some earbuds so he could watch some TV on his phone while he waited.

Nervousness wasn't something that Ronda was accustomed to, not at all. As a result, the last few minutes had been terrible for her, but as she walked towards her doctor, if she was even a doctor - she certainly didn't look like one - Ronda felt a bit better. What could there possibly be to be afraid of from a tiny woman like this, without a pound of muscle on her? Anyway, she actually did have a kind smile.

"Jenna Wilson," the woman said as she offered her hand for Ronda to shake.

"Ronda Rousey." Ronda took the hand, noting that the grip was weak. No surprise.

"Nice to meet you, Ronda," Jenna said, with warmth that matched her smile. "Come in and sit wherever you'd like."

Ronda walked into the office and took a second to look around as Jenna closed the door behind them. _'Y_ _ou make a lot of money doing this, huh?'_ Ronda thought. She was no expert on furnishings and interior decor, but she knew expensive when she saw it. Although it was all expensive, she also recognised that it was designed to do a job; to make the client feel comfortable, at ease. Neutral colours had been used everywhere, blinds at the windows, a choice of two comfortable looking chairs or a couch to sit on.

Not wanting to feel cramped or uncomfortable in any way, Ronda opted for the couch and sat down. "So, Doc, how do we uh, start?"

"Call me Jenna," Wilson said and wheeled her own chair out from behind her desk so that she could sit closer to Ronda. She had a notepad and pen in hand. "So, what brings you to see me today?"

"Uh," Ronda hesitated, looking down at her hands which rested in her lap. She realised this would give a bad impression, so she looked back up at Jenna. "Well, my fiancee, Seth and Maggie, my room mate, think I might have NPD. I mean, I think I have it. I want help for it, if I have, it I mean." Ronda had noticed the first brief note being written down on Jenna's pad as she stumbled through her answer. It was probably a note about stupid people who thought they could diagnose themselves, she guessed.

"NPD? Why is it that Seth and Maggie think you have NPD?" Jenna asked easily.

Jenna's tone hadn't changed at all. Ronda had expected to feel like she was being judged for some reason, but that wasn't the case. It was still difficult to try and find an answer to the question. "Well, I just, uh, do stupid shit all the time, you know, at work."

"What kind of things?" Jenna asked, her tone encouraging.

Ronda found herself feeling slightly more at ease with this woman already. Her voice was soothing and encouraging in equal measure. It was no surprise that WWE used and recommended her. "You know, things I shouldn't. Things I know I shouldn't. I just do them anyway. Like this last week, I was at NXT. That's this show WWE have for the up and coming wrestlers. They go there to train before being promoted to the other shows, if they're good enough."

"I'm familiar with NXT, with WWE's structure," Jenna clarified pleasantly. "You were at NXT; what went wrong?"

Ronda paused for a moment, not due to nervousness but to find a way to answer as honestly as possible. "I was refereeing the main event, Devon Dawson against Naomi. Devon fucked a spot up, that's what we call a move, and she cut her head on the ring post. She started pissing blood everywhere. I got her back in the ring and asked her if she was okay, and she said yes." Ronda cleared her throat. "Do you have any water or anything?"

"Sure." Jenna got up and fetched a bottle of water from her desk, which she handed to Ronda, who opened it and drank half of it in one hit. "Okay, so I got Devon back in the ring and Hunter, the boss, comes through in my earpiece from the production office. He tells me to get the doctor in the ring, which means like, stopping the match pretty much."

"Did you stop the match?"

"No," Ronda said, sounding a little embarrassed by the admission.

A note was made on the pad. "Did Hunter ask you more than once to bring in the doctor?"

"Yeah. Like, three times. He went pretty fucking crazy, but I ignored him."

"Can you tell me why you did that?"

Ronda sipped some more water, using it to buy her some time to come up with an answer. She reminded herself that she had come into this determined to be honest; it was the only way to get help. "I didn't like the idea of stopping a match for blood. The guys don't have to do it anymore now that we're rated fourteen, so why should the women? It's bullshit."

Another note was scribbled down. "Do you like working for WWE, Ronda? Do you enjoy your job?"

That question came at Ronda from left field. "Of course I do," she said in surprise. "I love wrestling. I've watched it since I was a kid. It's great. Going out there in front of a huge crowd, the reaction when your music hits, hearing the crowd cheer or boo you. I love all of it."

The pen went to work again. "Is it only at work that these kinds of things happen?"

Ronda considered that for a moment. "Only at WWE, really. I work with Adidas a lot, and Oakley. I'm sure you have a TV, so you must know that. But yeah, only WWE really."

"Why do you think that might be?"

The first response that Ronda thought of was to ask how the fuck she was supposed to know, but she quickly realised that wouldn't help. Instead she gave it some thought while she drained the water bottle and set it down on the floor in front of the couch. Two things came to mind, and neither of them would make her look good. Again, she forced herself to be honest. "Two things, I think. Until that last time, at NXT, I used to get away with pretty much whatever I wanted. I think Hunter has a soft spot for me, or I should say, he did have. He signed me, twice, and he let me off lightly with some stuff I did in the past. I guess that didn't help. But the other thing is that when I wrestle, or even when I have to referee or do a talking segment, everything has to go just the way I want it. It all has to be perfect. Like, I have a pre-match routine. If that gets screwed up, my match will suck. If I don't like what creative has written, I can't stop thinking about how it _should_ have been written."

Jenna had written several things down during the last exchange. Ronda wondered if that was a good or bad thing, but then focused on the next question.

"Your pre-match routine, can you tell me about it?"

"Sure," Ronda agreed, a little surprised by the question again. "I have to sit in silence, in my locker room. I have to be able to visualise how the match is going to go. I have to be able to see the finish, to hear the commentary, to imagine how the crowd will react. It all has to feel right. Then I walk to Gorilla, where we wait before we enter the arena, and I wait there and go through the whole thing again really quickly while my opponent makes their entrance."

"And you insist on silence the whole time?"

"Well, it's not silent in Gorilla. You can hear the crowd, the entrance music, and there are people everywhere, but I don't speak to anyone. I keep myself focused. I have to keep focused."

"It all has to be just right," Jenna said, sounding as though she understood rather than as if she was asking a question.

Ronda answered anyway, "Right. I don't even say good luck to my opponents. I'll bump fists with them, but no talking. Talking loses focus." She paused and shook her head. "I sound fucking crazy, don't I?"

"No, Ronda, you don't sound crazy," Jenna smiled. "In fact, I'd say this has been a very productive first session."

"That's it? We're done?" Ronda asked. Yet again, she was surprised. The time had flown by, rather than being the torture that she'd expected.

"We're done," Jenna nodded.

"So what's the verdict?" Ronda asked eagerly.

"We'll need to see each other a few more times before I can give you a firm diagnosis, but I think it's likely that there are a combination of issues which are causing you problems. For now, we need to leave all of our cards in play, so to speak. The good news is that I don't see anything that we can't work on, anything that isn't treatable. If you're willing to come back for more sessions, I'm very confident we can get you to a much better place in your life."

"Treatable?" Ronda asked hopefully. "You mean we can get a place where I can stop doing the crazy shit that I do?"

Again, Jenna nodded, then asked, "Is that what you'd like us to do?"

"Definitely," Ronda replied without hesitation.

"Alright then," Jenna said, sounding pleased. She stood, closed her notepad and set it on her desk as she said, "What I'm going to have you do is make an appointment at reception to see me again a week from today. Is that convenient for you?"

"I'll be here," Ronda promised, standing up herself.

"Excellent. Nice to meet you, Ronda." Jenna offered her hand for Ronda to shake again.

"You too Doc, uh, Jenna." Ronda shook the hand without focusing on the weak grip and then walked out of the office.

In the waiting area, Seth saw the door open and Ronda walk out with a smile on her face. That was definitely a good sign. He quickly removed the earbuds from his ears and stood up. "Hey, babe. How did it go?"

"Quite well," Ronda said, accepting his brief hug.

"That's great," Seth said, although the news surprised him a little. "So what do you have? Did she say?"

"Not yet. We have to talk more before we get that far, but she wrote a bunch of stuff down. I think she has a very good idea what I have, and she says it's treatable. I'm going to keep working with her and we're going to deal with this shit, like I promised you. I've got to book an appointment for next Wednesday on the way out."

Seth had rarely felt so proud to be with her than he did at that moment. Already he imagined how much better life would be if Ronda was able to take meds, or do whatever else was needed, to stop her attitude flare-ups from happening. "I love you, babe," he said, leaning in for a kiss.

Ronda kissed him said, "I love you too. So, what's the plan now?"

"Well, it's lunch time, so how about we go find somewhere expensive to eat, then we go check into our hotel and we don't come out of the room until tomorrow morning?"

"Oh," Ronda said softly, looking longingly at Seth. "That sounds ideal to me. You're the reason they say I'm out of shape, you know that?"

They began to walk towards the reception desk. Seth grinned at her slyly. "I do plan on giving you a thorough work out."

Ronda fought not to laugh. "Asshole."


	18. Chapter 18

Backstage before Raw, Ronda found herself thinking that, as usually seemed to be the case, things seemed to be moving very fast on her life. Monday night certainly seemed to have come around ridiculously quickly again. In the past week alone, she had been to her first therapy session and had also filmed the new entrance video for Evolution.

The therapy session had gone better than she could possibly have expected. Going in, she was determined to work with her therapist to deal with whatever issues she had. It had been made easier by the fact that she actually found Jenna Wilson to be easy to talk to, which had been a pleasant surprise. Of course, that was meant to be the case with a therapist, but Ronda knew that she could easily have taken a dislike to the woman, which would have caused the session to go a lot differently. Jenna hadn't been able, or maybe wasn't willing as yet, to give her a definite diagnosis. The good news was that Jenna had said she believed Ronda's issues to be treatable with a combination of more therapy sessions and medication.

Then on Friday there had been the shooting of the Evolution entrance video with Stephanie, Sarita and Devon. Ronda had expected being a guest at Stephanie's house to be awkward due to the fact that she was in the dog house with Hunter over her recent misadventures. She had presumed this would mean that Stephanie would be off with her too. The reality had been the opposite. Stephanie had been very friendly and welcoming to all three of her employees. They had shared a truly outstanding lunch together in the garden before the shooting had started and all four women had enjoyed it, even Ronda. It was definitely better to be friendly with the women she was going to be working and teaming with every Monday night for the foreseeable future.

The first part of the shooting had required the four women to each drive an expensive sports car, which was perfectly fitting for the image that Hunter wanted for this new Evolution team. Four cars had been rented for the day; two Ferraris, one red, one black, and two Lamborghinis, one lime green and one light blue. Stephanie had pulled rank and insisted on having first pick; opting for the red Ferrari. Ronda had been invited to choose next, and with black being her favourite colour, the choice had been a no-brainer. She had enjoyed driving the Ferrari so much that after a couple of hours she didn't want to give it back. There and then, she had decided that she was going to buy one for herself, reasoning that there would be nothing wrong with indulging herself with a nice car to drive.

On Saturday, when she had finally been able to get in contact with him, it had been with a sense of pride that Ronda had talked to her friend and mentor Ric Flair about her first therapy session, telling him in detail how it had gone. There was no doubt that Ric had played a part in getting her to the point where she not only acknowledged that she needed to seek help from a therapist, but actually wanted to do so. Ric had been delighted to hear the positive news and had promised her that he would see her at Raw, which was why she was now heading for catering, having received a text from him a couple of minutes earlier asking her to come join him.

It was still relatively early in the afternoon, so when Ronda arrived at catering she saw that it wasn't very busy. She noticed Ric sitting at a table off to the right hand side of the large room and started heading over to him. There was a blonde woman sitting opposite Ric. Something instinctively told Ronda that this was Ric's daughter, Charlotte. He had mentioned several times that he intended to ask her to come to a Raw event so that she and Ronda could meet each other. It had been something that Ronda had been looking forward to.

Ric saw Ronda approaching the table just before she got there, and smiled. "Hello, Ronda. Come and join us and meet Charlotte, my daughter."

Charlotte had turned to face Ronda as Ric spoke and also smiled. "Hi, Ronda. Great to meet you at last. Dad's told me so much about you."

"And you still want to meet me?" Ronda joked as she shook hands with Charlotte. "I've heard a lot about you, too. It's awesome that you managed to come."

Ronda sat down beside Ric and the three began chatting away. Half an hour seemed to go by in a blink of an eye, with them all absorbed in the conversation which began with discussion about Charlotte's background and the gym that she owned with her husband, then moved on to the creative plans for Evolution, which would be debuting in a matter of hours.

"I need another coffee," Charlotte said eventually. "Can I get anyone anything?"

"Not for me, thanks," Ric said.

Ronda said, "Yeah, I'll join you in a coffee. Milk please, but I better go with no sugar. I'm in bad shape, apparently." It was a jab at some of the recent criticism that she had gotten online, claiming that she was out of shape and was putting on poor matches as a result.

"Sure you are," Charlotte said, grinning as she shared in the humour. She left the table to fetch the drinks.

"So, I'm going to be tagging for the foreseeable future," Ronda said to Ric. He had been the one to break the news to her regarding WWE's latest creative plans for her. Evolution would form as a stable tonight, and from that point on Ronda would be wrestling tag team matches with Sarita Lopez as her partner.

"How do you feel about it?" Ric asked.

"Not convinced," Ronda said after a moment of consideration. "I mean, I get along with Sarita okay, but you've seen the critics hammering what's been going on and I agree with them. I'm being tossed around all over the place, wrestling Steph, tagging with Lesnar, wrestling Orton. It's like they're throwing shit at a wall and waiting for some of it to stick." She looked Ric in the eyes, wanting him to know that she meant every word she said as she continued. "I'm just going to keep my head down, get on with it and try my best though, like I told you. I don't want Hunter to fucking release my ass again."

"I know you will," Ric said, smiling in such a way that told Ronda he was happy to be able to say it. "Since you came back, since that night I met you backstage at the Rumble, you've changed, Ronda. And most importantly, you've accepted that you have problems you need to work on. Asking for help can often be the biggest step, and you've done that by going to see this therapist. There's quite a long way to go for you to get back in Hunter's good graces, but you'll get there. I know you will. You'll get there and you'll finally start to live up to all of that potential I saw in you. I'm proud of you, girl."

The last sentence came out of nowhere for Ronda. When she and Ric had first met back at the Royal Rumble earlier in the year, he hadn't held back in telling her some truths about her attitude and how she was acting like she was bigger than WWE, and he had pointed out how disrespectful that was to both her employers and her colleagues. It was then that she had told herself she would improve the way she acted, and one day Ric would tell her that he was proud of her for doing it. Now that it had just happened, Ronda felt her eyes tearing up. "You're proud of me?" she managed to ask, feeling the beginnings of a lump forming in her throat.

"Of course I am. Keep in mind that it's probably because at my age I'm losing my marbles..." Ric let his voice trail off and then laughed.

"Shut up," Ronda said and hugged him, as much to prevent him from seeing her crying as anything else.

"You just make sure you keep making me proud, okay?" Ric said, returning the hug.

"Okay," Ronda managed to gulp out. She knew that if she ever needed motivation to go to a therapy session, or to suffer through some more appalling creative, or to deal with reading negativity about her online, all she would need to do was look back at this moment.

* * *

Devon Dawson had just won her first ever match on Raw. It was only a victory over Summer Rae - hardly anything to shout about - but a win on Raw was a win on Raw. The commentators hyped up the successful debut of the former NXT Women's Champion; Devon having lost that belt on the most recent NXT event. Rather than leave the ring after getting her hand raised, Devon shrugged the referee aside and went right back to attacking the defenseless Summer, picking her up, tossing her into the corner of the ring and then stomping on her as she slumped helplessly against the bottom turnbuckle.

"Alright, that's enough," Byron Saxton complained on commentary. "You won the match, Dawson."

"Devon's making a big impression here," JBL said, sounding like he was impressed with her actions.

At that moment, Naomi slid into the ring, seeming to have appeared from nowhere. She went right after Devon, the two women frantically trading blows. "Here's Naomi now," Saxton called out. "One of Devon Dawson's biggest rivals from her time on NXT." Naomi's punches forced Devon to back into a corner of the ring, but Devon then raked Naomi's eyes, leaving her staggering around the ring, holding her face in pain. "Rake of the eyes, and oh, what a kick to the face! Devon Dawson just about kicked Naomi's head clean off her shoulders! Summer Rae and Naomi have both been taken out."

The crowd was booing, but Devon still wasn't finished. Shoving the referee aside once more, she pulled Naomi roughly too her feet and then picked her up on her shoulders, ready to deliver her finishing move. Before she could deliver the move, the familiar Motorhead theme song for Evolution began to play, along with an edit of the new entrance video which only featured Stephanie, Ronda and Sarita. It took a second or two for the crowd to react to the music, with some people booing and some instinctively cheering the fact that a new faction had obviously been formed.

"What?" Saxton said. "Wait, Evolution? I don't understand."

Stephanie, Ronda and Sarita walked slowly out onto the stage with Stephanie in the middle of the trio, drawing another mixture of boos and cheers from the fans. All three women were wearing very expensive looking business suits. Ronda was the first one to very deliberately remove her jacket and drop it onto the stage. Devon was shown tossing Naomi aside like a piece of garbage, now looking at the women on the stage with a concerned expression on her face.

"Stephanie said last week that it was time for women to be the Evolution of WWE," JBL pointed out. "Now we know what she meant. Devon, you might want to get out of there. I don't think you're going to like your part in this."

"There's been no love lost between Devon Dawson and Ronda Rousey in recent weeks," Saxton reminded everyone.

Evolution were now beginning a very methodical walk down the ramp, as though they were stalking prey. All three of them had now removed their jackets. In a move that appeared to be either incredibly brave or incredibly foolish, Devon rolled out of the ring and stood in their path, or at least that was how it appeared for a few moments.

Saxton said, "Devon's lost her mind if she's... Wait, Stephanie walked right past her. What's going on here?"

"I don't know, but I think we're about to find out," JBL said quietly.

Stephanie had indeed walked past Devon, and Ronda and Sarita did likewise. Stephanie raised her right hand with her index finger extended and made a circular gesture, clearly an instruction to surround the ring. Sarita walked around to the back of the ring, in front of the commentary positions while Ronda and Stephanie got up on either side. They all stood there, looking at Devon, who remained standing on the floor at the bottom of the entrance ramp, now facing back towards the ring. After a moment, she walked forwards and climbed up on the apron.

"Oh my," JBL said. "Is Devon Dawson on the same page as Evolution?"

"Oh, come on, John," Saxton said in frustration as the realisation hit home. "Isn't it obvious? Dawson and Rousey weren't at each other's throats, they were in on this together the whole time. Dawson's the only reason Rousey beat Randy Orton at Battleground, with her 'convenient' distraction."

In the ring, Naomi and Summer Rae were both struggling to get to their feet. Stephanie looked on, now with a sadistic smile on her face. "Now!" she yelled at the top of her voice. Immediately all four Evolution members entered the ring and attacked the two sacrificial lambs. The vicious beat down went on for more than a minute, with Saxton complaining bitterly and JBL reveling in it while the crowd watched on in a silence brought on more by distaste than disinterest.

With both Naomi and Summer now rendered completely defenseless, Ronda hauled Naomi to her feet, kicked her in the stomach and then tossed her in Stephanie's direction, setting her up for the Pedigree. Stephanie executed the move perfectly. "Pedigree," Saxton announced, his disgust more than obvious.

Suddenly the crowd began to cheer, the reason not apparent until Nikki Bella and Paige slid into the ring and began attacking Evolution. "Here comes the cavalry! Nikki Bella and Paige must have seen enough!" Saxton yelled. "They're taking it to Evolution! Down goes Lopez! Down goes Dawson! Down goes Rousey! And down goes McMahon!"

"You pair of idiots!" JBL protested.

The action was now frantic. Sarita quickly got back up and clotheslined Paige from behind while she was trying to get some more right hands in on Devon, sending Paige to the canvas. In turn, Nikki charged at Sarita and took her down with a forearm to the side of the head. She wasn't aware that Ronda was also up and waiting behind her, poised to strike. Nikki turned around and Ronda connected with her version of the RKO. Some of the crowd cheered, almost despite themselves.

"Thanks for coming, Nikki," JBL said sarcastically. "Ronda wants that move to be known as the Director's Cut from now on, Byron."

In the corner of the ring, it was now a three on one beat down with Paige on the receiving end. Saxton said, "Evolution all over Paige here. They're like a pack of dogs."

"One of them's your boss, Byron. You might want to chose your words a little better."

Saxton made a sarcastic grunting noise. Meanwhile, Paige had been dragged up off the canvas and was now being lifted into the air by Devon and placed onto Sarita's shoulders, in position for her finishing move, a sit down powerbomb. "Paige being loaded up by Devon Dawson..." Sarita delivered a devastating powerbomb, the impact seeming to echo throughout the arena. Again, some of the crowd cheered, but the majority watched on in silence.

"Sarita Lopez just broke Paige in half," JBL said. "It didn't go too well, sticking your noses in Evolution's business, did it, girls?"

Evolution's music began to play again as they made their exit from the ring. Ronda was shown with something approaching a satisfied smile on her face. Saxton said, "Ronda Rousey looking pleased with the damage that's been done. The four members of Evolution just laid waste to most of the rest of the Divas division, and it's all being masterminded by Stephanie McMahon."

When the four members of Evolution reached the stage, they turned to face the ring and stood side by side, posing with their hands raised in the air and arrogant expressions on their faces. JBL said, "We're seeing the start of something really big here. These four ladies are the Evolution of WWE."


	19. Chapter 19

For most people, the fact that their fiancee had managed to go to work and do their job without being involved in any kind of over-the-top drama or disciplinary issues wouldn't have even been something they gave a second thought to, let alone actively feeling thankful for it. Seth however, did feel thankful for exactly that. He knew that it wouldn't be accurate to say that Ronda was a completely changed woman. He wouldn't have wanted her to change completely anyway because he had fallen in love with her the way she was, flaws and all. There were still mood swings and moments of temper, but what was unarguably true was that she was trying her best. She had been attending therapy sessions once a week and had done everything that had been asked of her by WWE with barely a word of protest, a fact which Seth hoped had been noticed by Hunter and Stephanie as well as himself.

The diagnosis Ronda had gotten from Jenna Wilson was Oppositional Defiant Disorder, referred to as ODD. Seth had to admit that she did have all of the character traits associated with the disorder, among which were: arguing with others, defying or refusing to comply with requests, deliberately doing things to annoy others and blaming others for her own mistakes or misbehaviour. At least having the diagnosis meant that Doctor Wilson knew what she was up against and could now help Ronda with treatment.

It wasn't often that a chance to take a few days vacation came around for WWE's top stars. For that reason, Seth was in the habit of making the most of them when they did. When he had found out that he had Friday, Saturday and Sunday off, he had immediately set his mind to work on what he and Ronda could do for a short break. The perfect idea hadn't taken long to come to him: Go back to Honolulu, Hawaii, which was where he had proposed to her on their last short vacation together.

Unsurprisingly, Ronda had loved the idea, so they had jetted off for a weekend in the sun, with alcohol, fine foods and sex; the finest things in life as far as Seth was concerned. Right now though, Seth was partaking in something that definitely wasn't one of the finest things in life, in his opinion. One of Ronda's favourite hobbies was scuba diving and she had tried her best to talk him in to trying it out, even though she knew he wasn't keen on the idea. While he had stood firm and insisted that he wasn't going to do it, he had eventually agreed to a compromise, which was why he now found himself with a mouthful of seawater. Snorkeling was more difficult than he had expected it to be. He was a confident swimmer, but he hadn't been able to get the mask comfortable and every time he surfaced and took the snorkel out of his mouth he managed to end up swallowing salt water.

Ronda laughing at his awkwardness didn't help, which she did again as she broke the surface nearby and removed her own snorkel from her mouth. "What are you spluttering around like that for?" she asked, her voice sounding weird with the mask on her face.

Seth raised his own mask up to his forehead. "I'm done. I'm not enjoying this. You asked me to try it, I tried it. Now I'm done." Glancing around, he saw that nobody else from the boat load of people that were in the water around them seemed to be finding it as difficult as he was, which only made it more annoying.

"Cheer up, asshole," Ronda said playfully, splashing some more water in his face with her hand.

Seeing her enjoying herself made it impossible for Seth to stay sour. "Look, if you want to spend the rest of the day in a bikini, great, I'm all for it, but can we just go and do it on the beach?"

Seth saw Ronda raise an eyebrow behind her mask. "That's why you agreed to this? To see all of these girls in bikinis?"

Feigning resignation, Seth said, "Busted."

"You know I'm going to kick your ass, right?"

Seth thought back to the previous night in the hotel room and grinned. "You might try, again. The results would be the same, hopefully."

Ronda giggled and removed her mask. "Alright, you win. Let's get back on the boat."

"Thought you'd never ask," Seth mumbled and lead the way back to the boat. Within a minute he was climbing back onto the boat, already looking forward to getting back onto dry land and relaxing with a beer, preferably while lying on the beach.

One of the boat's crew approached them as Ronda followed Seth back on board. "Everything okay, guys?"

"Yeah, she just sucks at it," Seth said, crouching down to remove his fins while feigning offhandedness perfectly.

The crew member, not being in on the joke and therefore thinking that the comment seemed quite rude, said nothing. He took Seth and Ronda's gear and left them to it. "I'm seriously going to smack you before the day's over if you carry on like that," Ronda said.

"Better wait until we're not in public, babe. You'll get us arrested, doing kinky stuff like that in public," Seth grinned, turning her threat into an innuendo.

They headed towards the back of the boat where they could sit in the sun until the rest of the party finished in the water. Ronda sat down beside Seth and snuggled up to him. He wrapped an arm around her as she removed both of their phones from the waterproof wallet that she had been wearing around her neck while they were in the water. She looked at her own phone as she handed Seth's to him and said, "That's weird."

"What is?" Seth asked, not really paying attention because he was reading a text message from Roman.

"Charlotte Flair's called me, twice. And I have a voicemail. I got her number at that Raw a few weeks ago; said I'd call her when we're in the area and I'd go train with her in the gym she owns." Rather than listen to the voicemail, Ronda called Charlotte's number. There was only one reason she could think of why Charlotte would randomly call. "I hope Ric's okay."

"That guy? He'll be limousine riding and kiss stealing long after you and I are gone." Seth had tried to sound nonchalant for Ronda's benefit, but in truth, he shared her uneasiness.

Charlotte answered the call. Ronda could tell right away that there was bad news, it was unmistakable from her voice even though she only said one word, "Ronda."

"Is your dad okay?" Ronda asked urgently.

"He uh..." The line went quiet for a second. "He's gone, Ronda." Ronda's eyes filled with tears as Charlotte broke down. "My dad's dead. He died in his sleep last night."

Seth was looking at Ronda, waiting to find out what was going on, but it still surprised him when she hurled her phone to the deck as hard as she could, wailing like a wild animal in pain as she burst into tears. He didn't need to ask any questions. It was obvious what had happened and he knew how big a blow it would be to her. It was a blow to him too, but there had been a special connection between Ronda and Ric, who had been her mentor of sorts. Grabbing her in a tight hug, Seth attempted to comfort her in the kind of helpless gesture that was instinctive at a time such as this. "I'm sorry, babe. I'm really sorry."

He had expected Ronda to demand to know why Ric had to die, or maybe even to take her heartbreak out on him by trying to push him away, which at that moment he would have been fine with as long as it helped her somehow, but none of those things happened. The reality was even worse; Ronda just clung to him and cried into his shoulder, and cried, and cried. Seth knew why; Ronda's father had taken his own life when she was young. Ric had been something of a father figure to her, and now he was gone too. Added to Seth's own sadness was a sense of helplessness. His fiancee wasn't just saddened by this news, she wasn't just shocked, she was heartbroken by it.


	20. Chapter 20

"Are you okay, babe?" Seth asked Ronda as they got out of their hire car. As he walked around to her side, he thought that it seemed strange somehow to visit a graveyard on a truly beautiful morning, with the sun beating down on them and birds singing. It had seemed even more strange the day before, at Ric Flair's funeral. The eight days between his sudden death in his sleep, which had been put down to old age, were not going to be a period of time that Seth would ever want to remember, but remember them he would. It would be impossible not to remember his fiancee seemingly spending every waking moment crying. All Seth had been able to do was try and be there for her and comfort her, none of which had seemed to make the least bit of difference. Today though, Ronda hadn't cried as yet, even when she had asked if they could come back to the graveyard again. At this point, Seth was just going along with whatever she wanted, in the hope that it would somehow help her to deal with her grief.

"I've done my crying, or most of it," Ronda said, taking his hand. "Now it's time to say goodbye. I just couldn't do it yesterday, not with so many people around. It wasn't right. It was amazing to see him get such a turnout, though. So many people loved him."

Seth said nothing. There was nothing to say. Glancing at Ronda as they walked slowly through the graveyard, he knew that by just being there he was helping her in some way. When they rounded a corner and were able to see Ric's grave, Ronda froze and Seth felt her grip on his hand tighten. Someone was already there, having their own quiet moment of reflection or saying a personal goodbye. "Maybe we should come back later?" Ronda asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

Seth considered that for a second, then shook his head. "No, go up there," he urged. "Really, you should go up there. I'll wait for you here."

Ronda knew that he was right, it was the right thing to do. She closed her eyes for a moment to summon some courage, withdrew her hand from his, and walked towards the solitary figure standing in front of her mentor's final resting place. She hadn't expected to be greeted by a nod and a hint of a smile, but that was what happened as she approached. "Morning Ronda."

"Hello, Vince," Ronda said quietly. She had no idea what else she could say to WWE's former Chairman. It was because of her and her attitude problems that this man had been required to stand down from his own company a few years earlier. Vince had considered her to be unmanageable and had decided to release her from her contract with WWE. The fans had reacted to the announcement with the kind of backlash that hadn't been seen before or since. Now, Ronda knew that she had been the one in the wrong, not Vince. If anyone had deserved to be hauled over the coals by the fans, it was her. What could she possibly say to the man now, after what had happened?

For a couple of minutes they stood side by side in silence, both lost in their own thoughts and memories as they looked at Ric's headstone. Eventually Ronda said, "I wanted to come say goodbye, you know, a private goodbye."

Vince bristled at that. "You're trying to tell me to leave?"

"No, that's not what I meant," Ronda said hurriedly. "Stay, please. I meant without so many people around. You know, how it was yesterday. There's something that I wanted to do and something I wanted to say to Ric."

"I understand what you mean," Vince said, calmly now. "He meant a lot to you didn't he? Hunter told me that you were working together and that things were, uh, improving."

Ronda felt tears welling up in her eyes. "Yeah. I owe him so much. It was Ric who pointed out how... bad my attitude was. I have problems, Vince, but I'm dealing with them now, as best as I can. That's purely thanks to Ric, and Seth of course." She turned to look at Vince and he met her gaze. "I'm sorry, Vince. That doesn't mean much to you, I know, but I'm sorry. What happened back then was my fault, not yours. I know that now."

Vince nodded slightly, but didn't say anything. They both returned to looking at Ric's headstone. A minute or so later, Vince made a decision. Forgiveness was a powerful thing. "Listen, Ronda. I'm going to head off. Hunter and I are getting some of the guys together this evening to share some memories of Ric, things like that. You know, to celebrate his life rather than mourn him. That's what he would have wanted. Why don't you join us?"

Ronda looked at him in surprise. She realised that Hunter would almost certainly have been sure to tell her about this get together later in the day and invite her to come along, but Vince had wanted to do it. This was more than an invitation to celebrate Ric's life, it was Vince saying that he was willing to put the past behind them. "I'd like that, Vince. Thank you," she said politely.

With that, Vince gave Ronda a little squeeze on the shoulder and walked away, leaving her and Ric alone. It was time to say her piece, but a lump was forming in her throat and the words failed to come. After a moment of silence, she sighed. "You know, I had an entire speech in mind. It's gone now, though. I just wanted to say goodbye, a private goodbye. I'll always miss you. It's never going to be the same backstage without our conversations over coffee or over a meal. Every time I walk into catering, I'll expect you to be there."

Ronda wiped tears from her eyes and took a deep breath before she could continue. "I know you're still going to be around, like my dad's still around. I'm sure you're both watching me now and wishing I wouldn't cry, but I can't help it. Ric, it's because of you that I've started to turn my life around, and I'm much happier because of it. I'm going to keep seeing Jenna, and I'm going to deal with my problems. I'm going to do my best to be even half as good a person as you, so that I can see you again some day."

Tears streamed down Ronda's face now and her voice broke. "I love you, Ric. And dad, if you're there? I love you too. I hope you're proud of me? I'm getting myself sorted out. I've got Seth to help me. He's really amazing to me. I'm sure you know that anyway. I'm sure you check in from time to time. And Ric? You do the same, okay? I'm going to go now, but I wanted to leave you something, to say goodbye and to keep us close, somehow."

Without hesitating, Ronda removed her wristband, crouched down and dug a small hole a few inches deep in the fresh soil of Ric's grave and then buried the wristband in it. "I love you," she said softly. At that moment, she sensed a presence behind her.

"You okay, babe?" Seth asked quietly. He had spent a couple of minutes talking to Vince, so that Ronda had the private moment she'd wanted.

"Yeah," Ronda said, wiping her eyes once more as she stood up. She kissed Seth on the cheek and took his hand. "I've said goodbye. Vince invited us to join a bunch of the guys later to celebrate, to share memories. I said we'd go. Ric would want people to celebrate him rather than crying over him, even though it's so hard."

They began to walk back towards the car as Seth said, "I love you babe."

"I love you too, honey," Ronda said, squeezing his hand tightly.

That night, a picture went viral on Twitter. Ronda and Vince were both tagged in it. This time though, it went viral for all the right reasons. The picture had been taken and uploaded by Stephanie McMahon. It showed Vince, Ronda and Seth standing in a function room at a hotel, obviously in the middle of a conversation. All three were laughing. Stephanie's caption read: Never say never in WWE!

END


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